MODERN THOUGHT
AND THE
CRISIS IN BELIEF
¥L. M . M^ENLEY
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Copyright }l^
CDPyRIGHT DEPOSIT.
THE BALDWIN LECTURES, 1909
MODERN THOUGHT AND THE
CRISIS IN BELIEF
^9 ^^ b
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THE BALDWIN LECTURES, 1909
MODERN THOUGHT AND THE
CRISIS IN BELIEF
\y ^BY
R. M.^WENLEY
t:
D.Phil., Hon. LL.D. (Glas.), Sc.D., F.R.S. (Edin.),
Hon. Litt.D. (Hobart)
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
1909
A/i rights reserved
LIBRARY of CONGRESS
Tv/o CoDies Received
FEB 21 ia09
gf Copyriunt Entry _
CLASS O. XXc, No.
COPY 3.
Copyright, 1909,
By the MACMILLAN COMPANY.
Set up and electrotyped. Published March, 19094
J. 8. Gushing Co. — Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
^
"La pensee semble d'abord n''etre que I'esquisse affaiblie
des choses; elle est mieux : elle en est Piddalisation vivante,
en voie de realisation."
— Fouillee.
" The historic personage
Put by, leaves prominent the impulse of his age ;
Truth sets aside speech, act, time, place, indeed, but brings
Nakedly forward now the principle of things
Highest and least."
— Browning.
" Und diess Geheimniss redete das Leben selber zu mir :
' Siehe,' sprach es, ' ich bin Das, was sich immer selber liber-
winden muss.' "
— Nietzsche.
ORIGIN OF THE FOUNDATION AND
EXTRACT FROM THE DEED OF
TRUST
Having regard to the peculiar conditions at the
State Universities, where students of all denomina-
tions stand on an equal footing, and where, there-
fore, no theological faculties can be erected, the
Right Reverend Samuel Smith Harris, Bishop of
the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Diocese of
Michigan, in 1885, executed a Deed of Trust with
certain influential laymen of his diocese. This was
one of the first steps in what is known as the Guild
Movement, now widespread and still growing.
The Guilds are representative of the various denom-
inations, and, as a rule, maintain their own halls,
with libraries, reading rooms, gymnasia, etc., as
headquarters for their students, and as centres of
religious activity supplementary to their local
churches. Lectureships often form a part of their
plan. Thus, as a result of Bishop Harris's efforts,
Harris Hall was built and endowed, to be the head-
quarters for all members and adherents of the
vii
Vlll ORIGIN OF THE FOUNDATION
Protestant Episcopal Church who are teachers or
students in the University of Michigan. The
Hobart Guild was instituted to use and to govern
the Hall. The Baldwin and Slocum Lectureships
were founded, with adequate subventions, due also
to Bishop Harris's enthusiasm. They are delivered
in alternate years.
The portion of the Deed aforesaid, relating to the
Baldwin Lectures, runs as follows: —
''Now, therefore, I, the said Samuel Smith
Harris, Bishop as aforesaid, do hereby give, grant,
and transfer to the said Henry P. Baldwin, Alonzo
B. Palmer, Henry A. Hayden, Sidney D. Miller,
and Henry P. Baldwin, 2d, Trustees as aforesaid,
the said sum of ten thousand dollars to be invested
in good and safe interest-bearing securities, the net
income thereof to be paid and applied from time to
time as hereinafter provided, the said sum and the
income thereof to be held in trust for the following
uses : —
"i. The said fund shall be known as the En-
dowment Fund of the Baldwin Lectures.
"2. There shall be chosen annually by the
Hobart Guild of the University of Michigan, upon
the nomination of the Bishop of Michigan, a learned
clergyman or other communicant of the Protestant
ORIGIN OF THE FOUNDATION IX
Episcopal Church, to deHver at Ann Arbor and
under the auspices of the said Hobart Guild, be-
tween the Feast of St. Michael and All Angels and
the Feast of St. Thomas, in each year, not less than
six nor more than eight lectures, for the Establish-
ment and Defence of Christian Truth; the said lec-
tures to be published in book form by Easter of
the following year, and to be entitled 'The Baldwin
Lectures'; and there shall be paid to the said lec-
turer the income of the said endowment fund, upon
the delivery of fifty copies of said lectures to the said
Trustees or their successors; the said printed vol-
umes to contain, as an extract from this instrument,
or in condensed form, a statement of the object and
conditions of this trust."
PREFACE
Speaking in the House of Commons several years
ago, that eminent and devoted churchman, Lord
Hugh Cecil, expressed himself as follows: ''On all
sides there are signs of decay of the Faith. People
do not go to church, or, if they go, it is for the sake
of the music, or for some non-religious motive. The
evidence is overwhelming that the doctrines of
Christianity have passed into the region of doubt."
Once more, the Bishop of Carlisle has affirmed:
''There are, perhaps, few things, and certainly
nothing of similar moment, about which men give
themselves so little trouble, and take such little
pains, as the ascertainment, by strict examination,
of the foundations and the evidences of their reli-
gion." Outspoken and weighty statements by re-
sponsible persons seldom lack foundation in fact.
Accordingly, in these Lectures, I have attempted a
partial review of the situation, so far as my narrow
limits permit. Thus, in Lecture I, I have drawn
attention to the alterations that overtake reflective
constructions of belief. In Lectures II-IV, I have
xi
XU PREFACE
made an effort to summarize movements that justify
Lord Hugh Cecil's declaration. But, as I have
borne no part in the work of physical science and
higher criticism, I am able only to indicate the pres-
ent view from the conclusions of others. In Lec-
tures V-VIII, I have essayed, in my own way, the
examination suggested by the Bishop of Carlisle.
I cannot pretend to expert familiarity with theology,
so I have deemed it wiser to abandon this stand-
point, represented most adequately by many others,
and have confined myself to matters where I am
more at home.
It is obvious, to students at least, that we are
passing through a stage of transition where hazards
beset belief. Of course, I am well aware that a
broad distinction survives between the "beliefs of
the vulgar and of the learned," as they have been
called. But, under the educational arrangements
prevalent now, — and these Lectures are to hold
them in special remembrance, — it tends to fade,
with two results. On the one hand, some who deem
themselves 'learned' hug the idea that religion has
become a negligible quantity. Their learning has
not matured enough to make manifest the deeps of
our remanent ignorance. On the other hand, many
are puzzled, often distressed beyond measure, by
PREFACE Xlll
the metamorphic process coincident with enquiry.
They resent the stress placed upon natural piety,
and so they blink the issue, to sore harm of the re-
ligious cause; or, unappreciative of what knowledge
has gleaned, they cling to belief of such a character
that, under assault, it can scarce be distinguished
from the despair of a last resort. These are sad
hazards.
It were useless, possibly dangerous, to keep the
'vulgar' in ignorance of the ''wood, hay, stubble —
man's work," and therefore subject to loss, especially
as we still stand on the threshold of some scientific
and historical studies, more particularly those
destined to affect our views of the conditions and
nature of self-consciousness, and of the precise
environment whereout the New Testament and
early Christianity sprang. It were cruel, possibly
criminal, to keep the 'learned' in ignorance of "the
things which cannot be shaken," for, in preoccupa-
tion with corners of the garden, they are apt to miss
a just estimate of their own general presuppositions.
As a student, speaking in an academic community, I
have tried to show why, and to indicate some reasons
for doubting doubt that remains merely destruc-
tive. At the same time, my readers must bear in
mind that Lectures addressed to a general audience
XIV PREFACE
cannot be more than tentative. This ought to be
realized especially in connexion with the purely
illustrative uses to which I have put the ethical
consciousness.
Nobody knows so well as I the inadequacy of my
equipment for this difficult task; and few can have
had better reason to know how its prosecution calls
down anathemas alike from defenders of ''the faith
once delivered to the saints" — for whom religion
has achieved finality — and from rationalists who, in
their horror of the sympathetic fallacy, cherish the
notion that technical research can accomplish a per-
fect work. These I cannot hope to conciliate, much
less to convince. Time, that tries all, must be their
teacher. But for such as beheve that "the estab-
lishment of Christian truth," rather than its apolo-
getic defence or contemptuous dismissal, is an
important part of the second Reformation imposed
upon us by the contemporary course of science and
scholarship, I trust I have touched some things
worth further reflexion.
In any event, I have no apology to offer for my
view that religion is of primary importance to man-
kind. Belief bears its recompenses, because our
fragmental nature makes insistent demand for
completion.
PREFACE XV
I extend cordial thanks to several eminent scholars
who have taken the trouble to read portions of my
manuscript, and to suggest improvements. They
are not to be held responsible in any sense for my
errors or my opinions.
R. M. Wenley.
CONTENTS
LECTURE I
Sheaves on the Threshing-floor
Introduction ....
The New Attitude of Culture to Religion
The Nature of Intellectual Constructions
The Instability of Intellectual Constructions
PAGE
I
I
3
II
27
LECTURE II
The Waters of Meribah 41
Supposition and Science ..... 46
The Scientific Consciousness in its Methods and
Conclusions 54
LECTURE III
Breaches of the House .
The Historico-critical Movement
1. Ancient History
2. The Old Testament .
81
82
100
114
LECTURE IV
Humiliation in the Midst
The Historico-critical Movement {cofiiinued)
3. The New Testament ...
4. Christian Syncretism .
xvii
140
140
141
175
XVlll CONTENTS
LECTURE V
PAGE
The Preestablished Discord 190
The Roots of Conflict in Experience . . • 194
The Abstractions of Science and their Meaning;
Consequent Discords ...... 200
The Discord as it appears within Historical Science 221
Man forced to seek Refuge in the Ethical Conscious-
ness 230
LECTURE VI
The Adjournment of Well-being .... 232
Religion and the Ethical Consciousness . . 233
Teleology and Discontinuity . . . . . 237
The Time-series and the Ethical Consciousness . 245
Failure of the Ethical Consciousness to satisfy Man 251
The Passage to Religion 256
LECTURE VII
The Penumbra of Belief
Knowledge and Life
The Mystic Element in Religion
The Nature of Christian Conviction
What think ye of Christ ?
LECTURE VIII
278
278
289
297
312
The Valley of Blessing 324
Religion under the Conditions of Experience . . 324
Christianity as a Missionary Religion . . 325
Christianity and Secular Polity . . . 332
Christianity as a Process : Absoluteness and Change 344
Conclusion 358
MODERN THOUGHT AND THE
CRISIS IN BELIEF
MODERN THOUGHT AND THE
CRISIS IN BELIEF
LECTURE I
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR
The invitation of the Bishop and the Hobart
Guild, caUing a layman to deliver these Lectures
for the first time, can hardly pass without comment.
Inevitably, I must cut a sorry figure by comparison
with my eminent clerical predecessors. Yet, para-
doxically, the very fact that a layman lacks pro-
fessional bias may serve as a makeweight. In all
professions the initiate tends to fall under the sway
of certain conventions. Indeed, were this not so,
professions as such would cease to exist. Thus,
in dealing with professional subjects, the accredited
member of the craft inclines to accept a distinct
standpoint whereto he has grown, almost uncon-
sciously, through long years of training and asso-
ciation. Nay, the more he has earned the right to
appear as an adequate representative, the further,
2 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
as a rule, has this assimilation proceeded. I am
unaware that the clergy are greater sinners in such
respect than their brethren of the bar or the desk,
the sword or the lancet, even if their pubHc func-
tion, in preaching, render them a readier prey to
facile criticism. For every profession develops its
* system,' its 'form,' its 'ethics,' its what-not.
In the circumstances inseparable from these Lec-
tures, the tendency of the clerical 'system' might
result, conceivably, in partial failure to distinguish
between theology and religion, between creed and
conduct, between the church and Christianity, or
the like. So, once in a great while, it may prove
refreshing, if perilous, to expose the lay mind, even
with all its sins of feeble technique upon its head.
Again, one passes no impertinent reflexion in say-
ing that the clerical attitude towards religion is
defensive, in large measure. Nay, we laity force
this upon our ministers by our determination to
hold them men of other flesh, of other mould, than
ourselves. Accordingly, let us bear the blame,
great or small, when we repeat the acute remark,
"It is the mischief of the defensive method that the
class of facts against which a man has made himself
impregnable may be the very class of facts which it
is his chief business to know." More than likely,
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 3
your layman may have been placed midmost these
very facts in his daily work. If not, he may recall
the trite doctrine, that a spectator sometimes under-
stands more of the fight than those who are in the
thick of it. In any event, he can add at least,
especially as concerns religion, that he suffers the
same frailty with all his fellows; for he is the same
sinner, the same subject of ceaseless craving for —
" The light that never was on sea or land,"
the same wistful suppHant for — •
" the wings of faith, to rise
Within the veil, and . . .
Possess the promised rest."
It would be superfluous to adduce proofs of the
statement that, in a single generation, the position
of English-speaking folk towards 'Christian truth'
has undergone large displacement. So much is
quite sure. Moreover, one must remark, not merely
that this change continues, but rather that its in-
fluence affects wider and wider circles. It is no
part of my aim meanwhile to deploy reasons for
the modification. But one fact, slurred too often
just now, merits comment. Obviously enough,
man's estimate even of the deepest things of life
4 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
alters in face of new knowledge of nature, espe-
cially of organisms, brute and human. Darwin
was the —
" Calm priest of a tremendous oracle."
Yet, after all, the world, with its objects, vital or
non-vital, maintains a certain aloofness from those
ethical, aesthetic, and religious insights that serve at
once to differentiate man and to set his distinctive
problems. No amount of sophistication suffices to
obliterate the contrast between things, or stable
bodies, in the objective realm, and processes, or
inconstant successions, in the subjective sphere.
Despite their manifold, indelible relations, they re-
main two orders, amenable, perhaps, to similar
methods of research, but always so amenable in
different measure and with very contrasted degrees
of success.
We shall not be surprised to learn, then, that
''transvaluation of values" in matters religious must
stand to the account rather of historical than of
biological or physical investigation. Language and
literature, conduct and institutions, custom and
myth, society and law, worship and dogma, — these,
with their kind, together constitute man's peculiar
expression of his own nature. Thus, fresh results
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 5
in anthropology, ethics, comparative religion, criti-
cism, jurisprudence, ethnic psychology, and the
history of civihzation affect our estimates of the
significance, sweep, and implications of our common
humanity as no hypotheses concerning bodies, or
even the body, ever can. Being human, — •
"Some thought imprisons us; we set about
To bring the world within the woven spell."
Now, Germany was the mother-land of these fateful
'human' sciences. There they had origin, grew,
took definite shape, and found acceptance for nigh
a century ere they penetrated the English world.
Echoes were wafted overseas, indeed. But Coleridge
and Carlyle, Emerson and Browning prophesied in
the upper air to a stiff-necked generation. Their
early audience w^ould have little or none of them.
"'Pauline,' a piece of pure bewilderment," said the
London Athenceum, so late as 1833; and this was
sixty- six years after Herder, "the gatekeeper of the
nineteenth century," had published his epoch-mak-
ing "Fragmente." Nay, a quarter century later,
the greatest English scholar of the age, a man of
monumental learning, seems to stay stranded out-
side the main current of European thought. For
Whewell, in the third edition of his "History of the
6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Inductive Sciences" (1858), the enormous change'
wrought by Kant seventy-seven years before might
as well not have taken place. Its real meaning is
a mere vagrom rumour. Small wonder, then, that
misrepresentation or, as oftener, sheer ignorance
tangled the fundamental tendencies. Accordingly,
Germany arrived at a gradual appreciation of the
transitive principles peculiar to nineteenth- century
thought by a slow, cumulative process, beginning
with Winckelmann and Lessing about 1760; pass-
ing through the several stages of Kant, Herder,
Goethe, Fichte, Schelling, and the Romantics;
coming finally io clear consciousness in Hegel, and
that historico-critical upheaval for which he, more
than any other single force, must be given credit.
On the contrary, Great Britain and the United States
enjoyed no such period of formative transition. For,
all things considered, the movement burst upon
them in full panoply of power during the decade
1 865-1 87 5. Further, as if to accentuate the stress,
it synchronized with the home-thrusting dispute
over the Darwinian theory, and this at a moment
when the essential identity of the two schemes, in
ultimate attitude towards the universe, was not
apparent. As always, controversy clouded the main
issues at the outset. On the other hand, since about
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 7
1890 shouts of battle have diminished, party cries
and nicknames have found their due level, a process
of assimilation has wrought results in some measure.
We shall realize this more in detail later. Mean-
while, suffice it to say that we can now recognize the
reason why our intellectual atmosphere has not been
interpenetrated by these constructive ideas even yet.
Astonishing darkness prevails in certain quarters,
where illumination might be expected, while miscon-
ceptions so strange that one is forced to conclude
them undesigned to mislead, still provide pitiful
commentary. Nevertheless, we are bound to re-
member, in all charity, that when the waters of
evolution rose and the floods of criticism descended
at one fell swoop, dire shipwreck of their most holy
things seemed imminent to many. But, in any case,
perspective has altered. For example, it were im-
possible to-day that the hue and cry after the "Ves-
tiges of the Natural History of Creation" (1844)
should recur over a similar book. As Lamarck
said, browbeaten by his generation, "It is better
that a truth once perceived should struggle a long
time to obtain attention than that everything the
ardent imagination of man produces should be easily
accepted." ^
^ Philosophie Zoologique, p. 15.
8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
At this point let us pause to remind ourselves
sharply of some phrases used above. 'New know-
ledge of nature/ 'fresh results in criticism,' 'hu-
man sciences,' 'dispute over the Darwinian theory,'
and so forth. What do they imply? Or, shifting
the angle slightly. Does the average man possess
much lore concerning these things? The answer
is. They imply that religion involves an important
intellectual element, and that the average man, just
on account of his ignorance, may find himself at the
mercy of this element, to his comfort, or, as so often,
to his deep distress. By way of introduction, I pro-
pose to consider the grave problems lurking here.
An obvious course would be to set out from that
copy-book platitude, the distinction between religion
and theology. According to this view, the two 9,re
related as antecedent and consequent. The prius
of theology is religion; for theology represents the
reaction of reason upon inexpressible aspirations
that flow from the ' heart.' Or, once more, theology
broods among the shadows of abstraction, while
religion wells up naturally in the free manifestation
of faith. Now, admitting that such contrasts may
serve a purpose sometimes, it nevertheless remains
true that they are too naive. No one needs to
emphasize the evident differences between theory
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 9
and practice, logic and life, the state and the citizen,
pure and applied science; they float on the surface,
naked and unashamed. Meaning attaches to them
as aspects of a single whole, never as mutually ex-
clusive facts. They appear as incidents of a dia-
lectic movement, the one implies the other, and the
problem roots in the nature of the connexion, never
in the bare contrast. Whatever might be said of
origins, we are unable to seek light in the darkness
of the past; religion and theology so intertwine
now that jejune and odious comparisons preclude
any conclusion. To escape the consequent impasse
another method must prevail. Our sole resource
lies in an appeal to concrete experience. Religion
cannot exist apart from some view of its necessary
conditions, and these belong to human nature.
"Ein Traum, ein Traum ist unser Leben
Auf Erden hier;
Wie schatten auf den Wogen schweben
Und schwinden wir;
Und messen uns're tragen Tritte
Nach Raum und Zeit,
Und sind, und wissen's nicht, in Mitte
Der Ewigkeit !"
Taken at its best, knowledge about man leaves
much unknown and, very likely, unsuspected. We
cannot tell how we came by our perception of space,
lO MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
with its wonderful localization of objects, surely a
familiar affair. We know little about the brain, less
about its intimate functioning as the organ of con-
sciousness, nothing of the ultimate relation between
the two; while our acquaintance with consciousness
itself is lapped everywhere by the mighty ocean of
ignorance. In the nature of the case, our inferences
from the ascertained phenomena present themselves
synoptically. That is to say, we must rest satisfied
with results in gross, numerous factors being beyond
reach meantime. Yet, even so, some points almost
shout their presence. The reflective mind, at least,
seizes them immediately. For example, beyond
perad venture man's distinctive fate centres in his
double life, — on the one hand, an animal moved
to hunger and lust and cruelty, on the other, a sub-
ject of aspirations whereby he serves himself a little
lower than the angels. The eternal conflict between
these two sets all his problems, originates all his
fears and sufferings, but at the same time baptizes
him into all opportunity. At his sweet pleasure he
can ''idealize himself into dirt" with —
"a scrofulous French novel
On grey paper with blunt type,"
or into devilry, —
"Squat like a toad, close to the ear of Eve;"
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR II
anon, led by —
"The Star of the unconquerable will,"
he may vault time and space, —
"Pouring heaven into this shut house of life."
Of a truth, then, we men grasp keys to most varied
universes. These universes, in turn, together hold
the secret of the problem now under examination.
Accordingly, the question comes to be, (i) What
import are we to attach to the term ' universe ' ;
and (2) What 'universes' emerge if appeal be taken
to experience?
(i) In the present connexion, formidable although
it may seem, the word 'universe' need invoke no
serious terrors. On the contrary, indeed, it is a sim-
ple commonplace. For instance, we declare, with
perfect truth, that the American and the Englishman
live in different ' universes.' Historical traditions,
political organization, and social relationships dif-
ferentiate their respective estimates of life. To the
one a title imports less than nothing, to the other it
carries a clear conventional value ; to the one owner-
ship of land implies little, on the other it bestows a
distinct social status; the one conceives that money
can effect almost anything, the other is well aware
that some things, attractive to him, cannot be
12 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
purchased. Again, take men in the same society.
Contrast the successful merchant with the productive
scholar. To the former the career of the latter
spells failure — it does not pay ; to the latter the
career of the former misses full flavour — it does
not pay in the right way, for it sacrifices the man to
the bare pursuit. In a word, one of the most familiar
facts of life finds illustration in the universal ten-
dency to rate the same things differently, and by
consequence to judge human affairs from divergent
standpoints. The influences which, in sum, pro-
duce and maintain such phenomena we call a 'uni-
verse,' because it is the kind of totality forming the
customary world wherein a man seeks his spiritual
adventures. There he finds at once his aims and
his motives. Anyone who cares to study, say, the
proverbs of various peoples will grasp this immedi-
ately; opposed types of 'universe' are embodied in
the wise saws of the folk.
Dropping these manifest comparisons, the real
problem appears. If, on analysis, it result that
mankind tends naturally, on the whole and without
distinction of time or place, to reveal the occupancy
of certain 'universes,' then our enquiry will have
reached some conclusion.
(2) Luckily, Nature lends such efficient aid here
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 1 3
that no recondite process need ensue. For, whatever
his limitations, every human being admits that his
life presents two insistent aspects, neither of them
to be escaped or palHated in serious measure. For
better or worse, all occupy a physical and a psy-
chical 'universe.' The contrast between things and
thoughts forms the most evident, yet profoundest,
occurrence in life. No one has the slightest diffi-
culty in recognizing it, all assume it in the simplest
functions and arrangements of the daily round.
But the terms 'physical' and 'psychical' represent
vast complexes which, to a certain extent, we not
only can and do, but even must analyze. When I
kick a stone or a man, I do not anticipate precisely
identical reactions. We are prone to kick any stone,
we have been known to select our man. Again,
when I talk to a friend, or ponder some mighty
achievement in history, I am perfectly aware of
the great difference between the two events. Here,
once more. Nature aids us by the very obviousness
of her ways. Just as experience splits itself, with-
out any effort on our part, into the 'physical' and
the 'psychical,' so these subdivisions fissure in turn,
and after equally spontaneous fashion. The 'phys-
ical ' presents two unmistakable aspects, — things
and living things, especially our own bodies. In
14 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
like manner, the 'psychical' hives off into self and
other selves, the former dwelling almost breathlessly
upon its possible future here and hereafter, the latter
entrancing by their multitudinous past and puzzling
present.
These four 'universes' envelop man at every
moment. Negatively, he cannot flee from any one
of them; positively, he may enter any one at will,
and may mould his career in it more fully than in
the rest. They are, then: (a) things, from the
farthest star to the newest manufactured article;
(b) living things, from the simplest unicellular
organism to that organic community, amazing in its
involution, known as the human body; (c) other
selves, from naked savages, the prey of natural
forces, to strangely intertwined contemporary socie-
ties who harness wind and steam and electricity
and ether so that they obey them; from wretched
barbarians, whose idols are placated by unspeak-
able tortures, to Christian saints anxious to pour
out their all if haply the reign of Jesus may advantage
by never so little; {d) self, from the vague time it
could say ' I ' to those memorable moments when it
thrills, or falters, or weeps over the —
"obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things . . .
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 1 5
Blank misgivings of a Creature
Moving about in worlds not realized,
High instincts before which our mortal Nature
Did tremble like a thing surprised."
Our psychological organization is so contrived that
it rives the universal into these fractions, and con-
tinues thereafter under the main rule of one or
another; consequently, the indivisible reality secludes
itself afar. Here we meet the recurrent mystery of
the One and the Many, an enigma since the oldest
days of Hindustan and Greece. Yearning after
the One, men are fated to work out their salvation
in such a scramble of competitive aims that the task
of unification seems hopeless or impracticable.
"By the watercourses of Reuben
There were great resolves of heart."
Plainly enough, this entire analysis proceeds from
an intellectual reaction upon ordinary experience.
Principles of division are involved, and therefore
the operation of more or less extensive knowledge,
based on observation, attention, and reflexion.
Even the fragmentary views of current small-talk
presuppose no less. Now, as Darwin said, '*no one
can be a good observer, unless he is an active theo-
rizer." ^ In other words, facts and circumstances
^ Life and Letters, vol. i, p. 126.
1 6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
fail to reveal their true significance — or any sig-
nificance, for that matter — till arrangement over-
takes them. They demand a setting. A main vice
of popular thought issues from the tendency to
suppose that interpretations illuminating on one
level of experience suffice equally for any. Nay, one
may go so far as to declare that many difficulties
vexatious to Christians now, whether pro or con
some fundamental questions so called, originate in
just this loose procedure. When subjected to criti-
cism, they disappear or assume an altered aspect.
Consequences of mental refraction, their relation
to religion turns out more or less dubious.
"We live in deeds, not years; in thoughts, not breaths;
In feelings, not in figures on a dial.
We should count time by heart -throbs. He most lives
"UTio thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best."
At the risk of intruding dull or difficult matters, let
me try to illustrate the situation. The plan may
serve to clear our minds of cant.
Although the universe as a whole forms a single
unity, differentiation fills out our fleeting moments.
Man, for example, can be viewed as a machine or as
a 'living soul,' or as any one of a dozen things inter-
mediate between these extremes. But it is plain
that the mechanical factor functions in a subordinate
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 1 7
fashion when we emphasize the 'living soul' aspect.
While present necessarily, it does not determine
exclusively the treatment of the problem. And this
familiar subordination of some differences appears
characteristically when the constructions of know-
ledge come in question. The thinker or observer
never sidles up to objects in a merely receptive
frame of mind. The ideas he employs, even in
abstract processes, contain principles of direction;
the analysis, that is, proceeds with reference to an
end, and struggle as he may, contributes to the
end, moulds it accordingly. The method of ap-
proach cannot but be normative. A pure external
relation of subject to object is pure nonsense. Even
in theory we cannot view the two as if they stood
side by side like bits of china on a shelf, because they
never so present themselves in fact. A transitive
process operates invariably from the side of mind.
The simplest way to realize this is to take examples.
One instance from each of the four ' universes ' noted
above may suffice. To avoid the easy objection,
that I am preparing the ground, I have chosen quite
at random, and have allowed others to speak pur-
posely.
(a) The ^ universe^ of things. ''When a railway
carriage is running on a straight piece of road, we
1 8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
become unconscious of the motion unless we look
at external bodies; but we detect at once any
sudden change of speed. If the motion of the
train be checked by a sudden application of the
brake, their inertia (which really maintains their
motion) appears to urge the passengers forwards.
A sudden starting of the train produces the opposite
effect. While the steady motion continues, a con-
jurer can keep a number of balls in the air just as
easily as if the carriage were at rest. But these
things need not surprise us. Our rooms are always
like perfect railway carriages in respect of their
absolutely smooth, but very rapid, motion round
the earth's axis. The whole earth itself is flying
in its orbit at the rate of a million and a half miles
per day ; yet we should have known nothing of this
motion had our globe been perpetually clouded
over like Jupiter. The whole solar system is travel-
ling with great speed among the fixed stars, but we
know of the fact only from the minutely accurate
observations of astronomers, aided by all the re-
sources of the Theory of Probabilities.^^ ^
Here we have what logicians call crucial instances.
But, evidently, the crux, or sign-post, is dictated, as
it were, by the intellectual attitude of the observer.
^ Properties of Matter, P. G. Tait, pp. 95-96 (2d ed.).
SHEAVES ON THE THEESHING-FLOOR I9
Tait proceeded on the doctrine of inertia laid down
in Newton's first Law of Motion. This, once more,
lies embedded in Newton's third Definition of Force.
"The vis inerticB of matter is a power of resisting, by
which every body, so far as in it lies, perseveres in
its state of rest or of uniform motion in a straight
line." Now, all these propositions are controlled
by mental refraction. They represent abstractions
from experience, possible only to a being endowed
as man is. Within the sphere of things they apply
perfectly, nay, can be made the basis of further
interpretation. Professor Mach, for instance, would
combine Newton's Definition and Law in a fresh
and, as he conceives, more concrete statement.
"Bodies set opposite each other induce in each
other, under certain circumstances to be specified
by experimental physics, contrary accelerations in
the direction of their line of junction." ^ Excellent,
I suppose, in the realm of experimental physics, but
what meaning has it when carried over into the
fields of morals or religion ? The clew serves within
the definite range of experience whence it came.
In the psychological maze it leads nowhere.
{h) The ^ universe^ of living things. Here we
may avail ourselves of a case stated by Mr. xA.lfred
^ The Science of Mechanics, p. 243 (Eng. trans., 2d ed.).
20 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Russel Wallace. It offers an admirable illustration
of the inevitable tendency of theory to suggest reliable
meaning, to hint the end in the means.
*' Among the numerous applications of the Dar-
winian theory in the interpretation of the complex
phenomena presented by the organic world, none
have been more successful, or are more interesting,
than those which deal with the colours of animals
and plants. To the older school of naturalists
colour was a trivial character, eminently unstable
and untrustworthy in the determination of species;
and it appears to have, in most cases, no use or
meaning to the objects which displayed it. . . .
But the researches of Mr. Darwin totally changed
our point of view in this matter. He showed clearly
that some of the colours of animals are useful, some
hurtful to them. . . . That the colours and mark-
ings of animals have been acquired under the funda-
mental law of utility, is indicated by a general fact
which has received very little attention. As a rule,
colour and marking are constant in each species of
wild animal, while, in almost every domesticated
animal, there arises great variability. We see this
in our horses and cattle, our dogs and cats, our
pigeons and poultry. Now, the essential difference
between the conditions of life of domesticated and
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 21
wild animals is, that the former are protected by
man, while the latter have to protect themselves.
The extreme variations in colour that immediately
arise under domestication indicate a tendency to
vary in this way, and the occasional occurrence of
white or piebald, or other exceptionally coloured
individuals of many species in a state of nature
shows that this tendency exists there also; and, as
these exceptionally coloured individuals rarely or
never increase, there must be some constant power
at work to keep it in check." ^
Just so. The active element here is the intel-
lectual, for the simple reason that its predominance
alone guarantees an explanatory synthesis. But the
categories employed possess no more than analogical
value in ethics, say, while in numerous aspects of
experience they avail not at all. Suppose one were
to employ them to explain the ecclesiastical colours
proper to the seasons of the Christian year!
(c) The ^universe'' of other selves. A common
custom, more honoured in the breach than in the
observance, according to Hamlet, may serve our
purpose here.
"That one man should drink with another was
regarded by our forefathers as a more sacred symbol
^Darwinism, pp. 187, 188-190 (London, 1889).
22 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of brotherhood even than the sitting at meat to-
gether. This belief was derived, in part, from the
impression made by the stimulating effect of the
wine, mead, etc., whose intoxicating properties have
led to their choice by all peoples at all times for
ceremonial purposes. In part, however, the idea
of the inspiriting draught is associated with that of
the blood, universally considered by primitive man
to be the seat of the vital forces. He who drinks the
blood of an enemy takes to himself the dead man's
strength; he who exchanges a drop of blood with a
friend becomes thereby his blood-relation, as if a
son of the same mother. ... But as the age grew
milder, the symbolism of a draught from the same
cup took the place of the original ceremony. . . .
Soon the draught of brotherhood extended its range
beyond the individual; it became an emblem of
the union of host and invited guests, the cup travel-
ling from hand to hand at the common meal. So
the symbol reduces, first of all, to a simple sign of
friendship, and finally comes to be a mere expression
of social attention. When the cup ceased to pass
from mouth to mouth, and the greater luxury of
the time gave each guest his own drinking glass, the
common draught from the same bowl was indicated
by the touching of glasses, and the draught of
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 23
brotherhood between two comrades had degenerated
into the modern toast." ^
But, plainly, apart from a point of view, sugges-
tions of this sort would be impossible. In the time
of Newton they never occurred to a thinker even of
his genius, as his commonplaces on prophecy, that
elicited Voltaire's sneer, serve to show.^ What point
of view, then? Let Wundt reply himself.
"Every phase of our modern life is permeated
with usages that have survived from long-forgotten
cults. . . . Among them, too, are many fossilized
forms, the petrified remains of once living actions,
which owe their preservation simply and solely
to that vis inerticB which is as characteristic of our
ideas as it is of our material bodies. Now if we
consider the bare results of these transformations,
without reference to their historical past, we may
easily be misled into looking for their explanation
within the circle of our present experience, and sub-
stituting the aims which they do or might subserve
to-day for the true causes of their origination. But
* Ethics, W. Wundt, vol. 1, pp. 143-144 (Eng. trans.).
^ See his Observations upon the Prophecies of Holy Writ, par-
ticularly the Prophecies of Daniel and the Apocalypse of St. John
(in vol. V of Isaaci Newtoni Opera qua exstant omnia (1779-1785);
separately printed in 1733 and, with notes by P. Borthwick, in
1831. The edition of 1733 may be procured still).
24 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in doing this we should be forgetting a law that is
of the very highest importance in all mental, but
especially in moral, development : the law that man-
kind is prepared for the adoption of new ends of
life by modes of conduct already existent, but pri-
marily adapted to other ends. . . . The tendency
of custom to live on in new forms after the decay
of its original contents paves the way for the origina-
tion of the most varied purposes. And if, in the
last resort, it is a moral development that secures
the greatest advantages from this law of persistence
in the midst of change, credit is not therefore to be
given to the law, but only to the forces of which
that moral development is the expression." ^
Here, once more, the theory lays down the lines
of evaluation. And because it deals with the
* universe' of human psychology, its possible appli-
cation in the sphere of religion becomes apparent
on the face of it.
id) The 'universe^ of self. No man ever left a
starker self-revelation than Marcus Aurelius. Let
us listen to one of his naked confidences, meant for
his own eye alone.
" You consist of three parts — body, breath, and
mind. The first two are yours, to the extent of
* Ethics, W. Wundt, vol. i, pp. 139-140.
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 25
requiring your care : the third only is properly your
own. Now if you separate from your true self — ■
your understanding — all that others do or say, all
that you have yourself done or said, all that perturbs
you for the future, all that belongs to your material
shell or vital breath and lies outside your own control,
all finally that sweeps past you in the swirl of cir-
cumstance, if thus exempting and clearing your
mind-faculty from the play of destiny, you enable
it to live free and unrestricted, doing what is just,
willing what befalls, and saying what is true, — if,
I say, you thus separate from your Inner Self the
outer ties and attachments, the influences of time
past and time to come, and so make yourself, in the
language of Empedocles —
"A rounded sphere, poised in rotating rest;"
and train yourself to live in what alone is life — the
present — then you will be able, for life's remainder
and till death, to live on constant to the deity within,
unperturbed, ingenuous, serene." ^
A modem would not put it thus, because his out-
look involves a widely contrasted mental attitude,
based upon many new presuppositions. The em-
peror's cross-examination of self was conducted in
the light of later Stoic theory, and within the ethico-
* Book xii, 3 (the translation is Kendall's).
26 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
temperamental perspective peculiar to a Roman of
the highest official class in that age. The value and
importance of the facts could not but be rated by
reference to this transitive rational standpoint. The
tenour of the passage transcribed renders it unneces-
sary to explain why, with Marcus Aurelius, Stoicism
had ceased to be a philosophy and had transformed
itself into something hardly distinguishable from
religious aspiration.
Again, the subtle and pervasive influence of man's
inherited and acquired mental prepossessions con-
tinues ascendant among the most fearless and
capable contemporary thinkers. Moreover, the fact
that the vast majority remain quite unaware of its
enormous directive power, indeed, often deny it
angrily, serves but to confirm its sway. Nobody
would suspect Huxley, for instance, of treachery to
science, rather his devotion displayed itself in a
temper almost fierce. Nevertheless, did he not say
of mathematics, — the servant of all experimental
science as of many biological and sociological in-
vestigations,— it "is that study that knows nothing
of observation, nothing of induction, nothing of
experiment, nothing of causation?" Perfectly true,
no doubt; and yet, thanks to Huxley's very intel-
lectual passion, how far his irony —
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 27
"fails from truth by every stale-meant word
Half -wantonly meeting the times' demand."
I should not have troubled you with these far-
flung illustrations unless I had intended them to
hint a definite inference. It is this. The intel-
lectual factor in our experience even of the com-
monest things exhibits instability. Nature —
"speaks
A various language"
as she passes from star-swirl to mountain-peak, from
mite to man.
"Black spirits and white,
Red spirits and grey,"
is poetry or gibberish, as you please, never empirical
fact. But so is —
"Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet and blossom in the dust."
Thus, when we want to be perfectly clear intellectu-
ally, we discover at once that judgements luminous
m some spheres produce darkness visible in others.
Accordingly, we switch our mental currents, alter-
nating from the useless or even baleful to the appo-
site, as the context demands. Now, what is thus
true of individual experience in its several contem-
poraneous fields, holds also of genetic experience
28 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
when regarded in the light of its history. For us
to-day, the legend of the nymph Echo, who pined
away for love of Narcissus, till she faded to a mere
voice, excites incredulity or, mayhap, arouses laugh-
ter,— we feel inclined irresistibly to recall the
famous smile of the Cheshire Cat ! Our woods are
haunted no longer by Dryads and Hamadryads; to
ask us to order our lives as if this delectable com-
panionship still obtained, were absurd. Similarly,
the psychological perspective necessary for St.
Francis's preaching to the birds, or for Luther's
ink-pot lunge at the devil, has disappeared. In a
word, we regard such fables from another angle.
So, just as we cannot put a price on tears, or tell
the colour of love, we fail to explain blighted harvests
by cold winds sent from the interior of Jotunheim
by the Hrimthurses; meteorology has altered all
this. In face of ethics, and sociology, and eco-
nomics, we no longer seek counsels of perfection
from the Norns. And yet, transformed completely
as these intellectual outlooks are, our spiritual thrust
remains very much as it always was. With his
customary penetration, Jesus expressed this in that
memorable answer to the Pharisees, when they
advised him to flee from Herod. ''And he said unto
them, Go and say to that fox. Behold, I cast out
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 29
demons and perform cures to-day and to-morrow,
and the third day I am perfected. Howbeit I must
go on my way to-day and to-morrow and the day
following: for it cannot be that a prophet perish
out of Jerusalem." ^ Some experiences must needs
be lived, knowledge cannot satisfy their passion.
Others submit to logical constructions — causation,
for instance. And the former, despite their elusive
quality, seem to possess the power to bring us into
contact with such changeless, stable states as our
poor human nature prefigures. Intellectually, man
has ever walked to-day, and to-morrow, and the day
following; nevertheless, in the deepest things of his
spirit, it cannot be that a prophet perish out of Jeru-
salem; if he perish there, men will appropriate his
message preeminently.
But paradox supervenes here. Suppose we grant
(although it makes no vital difference to the argu-
ment) that the insights of a Gotama or a Jesus are
always embodied intellectually, by them as by their
disciples. It would thus appear that the primary
depends upon the secondary for its transmission or
maintenance, and in relative degree becomes second-
ary itself. I am unable to rest in this view. The
paradox seems capable of resolution. For, the con-
* Luke xiii. 32-33.
30 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
ceptual presentation of this, as of everything else,
cannot but be called symbolic. And the root of
numerous difficulties, as of endless religious con-
troversy, lies embedded in the constant tendency to
deal with the token as if it were the thing betokened.
The two patch up peace continually on terms det-
rimental to the one or the other; consequently,
they have waged, and wage now, an unbroken,
stern struggle. As the intellect presses forward to
sit in judgement, life shakes itself free and demands
justification. "Woman, believe me, the hour cometh,
when neither in this mountain, nor in Jerusalem,
shall ye worship the Father." ^ In the profoundest
sense, this hour never is, but always is to be. And
why? Because religion involves elements that elude,
not merely knowledge, but even the set purpose of the
men who, at any given moment, happen to have
formulated it. Or, in philosophical language, its
ultimate character is dialectical. To wit ; its constitu-
tive process is of such texture that the intellect cannot
dictate its truth, or force it to abide in dependence
on this or the other precise scheme. As the intellect
passes the religious material through its medium,
a transformation occurs which inevitably starts fur-
ther transformations from time to time. The quod
John iv. 21.
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 3 1
semper, quod ubique, et quod ah omnibus, so far as it
can be expressed propositionally, possesses, in the
very nature of the case, a local habitation and a name.
For, the tension of the complete manhood, so typical
of religion, cannot be reproduced by any species of
intellectual alchemy. The explicitness of logic, say,
necessarily removes one from the ' universe ' of religion
to a region that may turn out of a far different sort.
In brief, as knowledge clarifies the religious con-
sciousness, it fails proportionately to exhaust it.
So, doubt, or at any rate enquiry, finds due oppor-
tunity. The slighted portions, as it were, reappear
over and over again, with an imperative demand
that intellect abate its toll. Moreover, this process
consists in no appeal to sentiment, to feeling, or to
some vague belief in vaguer eventualities, as many
neurotic or credulous folk seem to suppose. Rather
is it a reference to facts that admit of no trifling.
The less must face a new triangulation of the greater,
in order to correct its partial computations. For,
clearly enough, the abstractions charmed by know-
ledge from life fall short of the actual fact. Even
the most general, and therefore the most true, ' law
of nature' never applied, as formulated, in every
observed case. How much more, then, the poet
hits the truth, when he writes, —
32 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
**I for an hour have grasp'd the great insight . . .
A system, self-containment which is beauty,
The beauty that my creed hath wholly missed."
Thus, when we carry the question of 'universes,'
with their evaluations and systematic prescriptions,
into the traffic between knowledge and religion, we
are bound to admit that the latter supplies the pos-
tulate. Of course, it is as impossible to separate
religion from conscious research and reflexion re-
garding its nature as to talk of a spiritual reality
out of all relation to the chemico-physical world
of our habitation. Notwithstanding, as matter of
soberest fact, this blind, mechanical, uniform earth
does contain the aspirations and plans of humane
beings. For us, morals, and art, and religion are
live things at least as potent as heat, and chemical
affinity, and cellular change. No one enjoys a mo-
nopoly of necessity more than any other. For, an
isolated necessity, a necessity that fails to square
with others incident to the same unity, were the
purest moonshine. Accordingly, as intellectual judge-
ments refract now this, now that aspect of our
inconceivably complex life, readjustments become
imperative, and such experiences as religion receive
novel, often unexpected, interpretations, even although
the fundamental ' stuff ' remain identical. Remem-
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 33
bering all this, I think we shall have laid hold upon
a clew that may serve to solve the maze surrounding
certain contemporary difficulties, even if, as we must
recognize quite frankly, our human nature stands,
as ever, —
"well-nigh vocal with
The insight of this tragedy of mute
Omnipotence."
Nor does the story cease here. As thinkers have
shown often, men are mastered by an ineradicable
tendency to express the ' spiritual ' and psychological
in terms of the ' material ' and sensuous. In its elabo-
ration upon Hfe, knowledge at once sjnicopates and
specifies by the use of images. The process serves
to throw light upon our condition, because it exhibits,
even when it neglects to emphasize, hmitations bound
up with our humanity. A cardinal example of this
procedure happens to have occurred, and to have
maintained itself more or less intact, midmost the
very subject of these Lectures. The materialistic
analogy from a geological specimen, or a river, or an
animal species has been applied, and with amazing
persistence, to ' Christian truth.' Search almost
where you please (time and place appear to be in-
different), and you will find the problem of religion
conceived as if the task were to trace the derivation
34 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of a fixed thing from a definite source. To attack
the question thus, however, forecloses the result.
The method only imports into the religious ' universe '
ideas that, primarily, possess no application there,
and, secondarily, raises false, even irrational, problems
by vicious analogy. The popularity of the attitude,
like its constant recurrence, furnish startling com-
mentary on the dangers superinduced by interferences
of intellectual abstraction. But, for this very reason,
it may be viewed as perfectly natural and explicable.
Interferences similar, say, to those of a microscope,
our conceptual constructs must be tested and cor-
rected, even altered or removed, ere we reach a posi-
tion to record the precise object before us. Aids to
observation and reflexion they prove from time to
time, without doubt; yet, plainly, they hold no
patent rights in truth. And the major difiiculty
incident to investigation of religion centres precisely
in man's habit of consecrating them as if they alone
embodied ascertainable truth. But, just like ^ laws
of nature, ' recognized openly as abstractions from
experience, these religious judgements are doomed
to change, and susceptible to purgation from ex-
traneous or temporal admixture. Negative instances
transform them. For example, the discoveries of
Copernicus, Lyell, and Darwin, on the one hand,
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 35
of Rawlinson, F. C. Baur, and Kuenen, on the other,
have altered them profoundly in the course of a brief
history; while they have been purified, with happy
frequency, by those miracles of concrete human life
called saints. On both sides, you see, hard and fast
system must submit to constant readjustment. Thus,
most conspicuously, God has justified his ways to man-
kind. You may conceive redemption in mechanical, or
juridical, or domestic terms; all prove to have been
no more than pictorial representations. The problem
abides unlaid, still capable of further illumination
by other less inadequate statements. So, if it be
true, as many tell us, that the collapse of dogmatic
Christianity forms the most significant among con-
temporary movements, we need not lose our heads
and give way to panic. Let us stress the adjective,
remembering that, in the words of one of the most
pious scholars of last century, ''many a traditional
idea which circulates amongst us seems credible
only because we have never examined it." ^ Let
us remind ourselves, too, that 'traditional ideas,'
like present opinions, are no more than essays to
prefigure religious truth more completely. For the
truth of religion cannot be brought in question any
more than the truth of nature, no matter how much
^ Still Hours, Richard Rothe, p. 68 (Eng. trans.).
36 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
or how often we may be led to revise our manner
of formulating both to our meagre understandings.
Finally, the considerations just adduced seem
to force the conclusion that, whatever religion may
be, it is not a set system of formulated doctrine, or
even an aggregate of clarified beliefs, especially be-
liefs in the existence of imaginary, or in the authority
and power of dead, personages. I have referred
to ' the tension of the complete manhood.' ^ By this
I mean to suggest that while, probably, a satisfac-
tory definition of religion is beyond reach, every
attempt at definition presupposes a certain psycho-
logical state, — often termed 'spiritual,' — a state pe-
culiar to human beings, so far as we can know. That
is to say, we are confronted by a process in experience,
ofifering the chief characteristics of other processes
in self-consciousness. In all likelihood, examination
would prove it excessively complex. Many coeffi-
cients would enter into its constitution; above all,
it would be directed by some ideal or apperceptive
evaluation which, in its turn, would show up endless
subtleties. It would imply "the control of our
activity as thinking beings by conditions which are
fixed for us and not by us." ^ And it might be very
^ See above, p. 31.
^ Analytic Psychology^ G. F. Stout, vol. ii, p. 239.
{',
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 37
prone to involve the fallacy, universal among savages,
common even among civilized folk, our neighbours,
of mistaking subjective for objective necessity. Be
all this as it may, the psychological situation in the
process of experience, tense enough to rise to the
levels of religion, certainly absorbs into itself those
main factors of the inner life known generally as
Intellect, Desire, and Will. Thus, as I have tried
to indicate, the expression by intellect alone falls
short of the jubilant reality, and unavoidably so.
Reason seeks order, completion, unity. But the
spirit-life swoops on, carrying intellect with it, and
exacting original perspectives for original conclusions.
Thus any effort after apotheosis of a single stage spells
failure. Sufficient with incomparable sufficiency as
the ' beautiful moment ' may be, its very perfection
breeds defect, the instant its day of due reckoning
passes.
"... the thoughts of men are widened with the process
of the suns."
The central and dominating fact in religion is its
imperious call for a new way of life; and this seeks
freedom as its indispensable condition. Yet, when
man comes to think of such matters, the central and
dominating fact is the imperious call for cut-and-
dried system, for something 'to go by'; and this
38 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
seeks bondage as its indispensable condition. They
have never been coordinate, never can be. On the
other hand, let the intellect fall as short as it may or
must, it is enlisted invariably, as if in veriest despite.
The new creature cannot escape self-caricature.
So, if the heretic of to-day miss beatification to-mor-
row, the golden words that hush mankind might
often fall upon silence. Every generation must
bear the burden of this lesson after its fashion. The
human soul chains itself at each successive sunset,
and, with the glow of the next dawn, would fain
strike off the shackles. But, enamoured of its
evening artistry, doubts and tears, angry passions
and ugly words beset it, as it rouses anon to the
sense of an undone task, and fondles the forms it
would fain break to be rid of impediments. Past
satisfactions indeed rest satisfactions; notwithstand-
ing, unprecedented sights so move, and prophetic
promptings so pulsate that the throb of joy becomes
the measure of unplumbed sadness. The ideal, as
stated, as something to be maintained stoutly, baulks
the ideal that beckons to distant and untried ends.
Our tragedy — and our salvation — pivot on a
religion that professes to come complete from a past
dead and done with; yet this religion is, or con-
tinues in vitality, only because quickened by the
SHEAVES ON THE THRESHING-FLOOR 39
perennial inspiration of the blood-tinctured present.
By a law of our innermost nature, then, we are con-
demned to pass through the valley of negation ere
we win any Pisgah-sight atop the mount of trans-
figured and transfiguring faith.
"For we are Ancients of the earth,
And in the morning of the times.
So sleeping, so aroused from sleep
Thro' sunny decades new and strange,
Or gay quinquenniads would we reap
The flower and quintessence of change . . .
The prelude to some brighter world."
In the three subsequent Lectures I shall attempt
to summarize the two intellectual achievements of
the past century that are responsible for most of
our present disquiet and unrest in religion; the
hazards of belief congregate here for us. As I fol-
low this difficult track, you must do me the favour
to bear in mind certain things. First, I shall be
compelled to deal with researches in which I have
borne no part. They lie as open to you as to me,
we are equally in the hands of their master-builders.
In other words, I shall speak, not as an authority,
but as any educated man might. Second, time-
limits require that discussions of pros and cons dis-
appear; these you can find in literature accessible
to everybody. Third, I fear many fail to realize
40 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
just what is fast becoming commonplace among
competent scholars; and so I am bound to arrange
the material in such a way that its cumulative effect
may strike straight home. This, indeed, will con-
dition the problem to which I shall invite your
attention in the four concluding Lectures.
LECTURE II
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH
While, as we have seen, religion eludes definition,
its character cannot be compassed in a series of
words, a very general description may not transgress
the bounds of prudence. Religion is a state in-
duced in self -consciousness by man's sense of his
own insignificance and imperfection, as contrasted
with the high vocation revealed to him by his ardent,
if froward, ideals. Incarnate only in human flesh,
this psychological condition energizes two ways.
On the one hand, it compels an accounting from
the physical world, or seeks reply from Nature to
all sorts of questions about which, fundamentally.
Nature must remain utterly dumb. Sweep the
mighty visibilities of the heavens with the telescope,
the minute invisibilities of the earth with the micro-
scope, intensify both range and power of observation
as you will, you are thrust back, to say, 'Behold, it
is not there ! ' The Sphinx is ever with us, for, on
the Whence, the Why, the Whither, this frame of
41
42 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
things, as our immediate perceptions disclose it, has
scarce a hint to offer. On the other hand, the
religious consciousness composes an interpretation
of 'spiritual' life, and would force the very gates of
heaven to assuage its yearning. But, in proceeding
thus, it quits the region of sober knowledge, and
acquires what no pure scientia ever pretended to
supply, — a constructive estimate of the relative
values to be put upon events possible and probable
nowhere outside the mystic regions of the soul.
According as the tension of the religious process is,
so will the satisfactions peculiar to this evaluation
be. Here solutions abound in plenty; but they
descend from their father, the heavenly vision, and
betray everywhere unmistakable traces of their line-
age, — an origin in ideal possibility, not in mundane
attainment.
"The night is come, and all the world is still.
Men say it is a time for sleep and dreams;
But now she throws no pall, upon the space
That spreads above me. . . .
Meseems
This is the hour for man to bend the knee
Of the full soul to the Divinity."
Now, even if the ideal truth of religion be thus
admitted, it were lamentable to forget that the
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 43
haltino; embodiment issues on earth. An intellect
manifested in its own refracting forms and processes,
emotions accompanied by the somatic states char-
acteristic of an animal, albeit the most complex
animal, and a will, foiled continually by circum-
stances that are none of its creation, impose terms
present in every statement. Thus, as these psycho-
logical factors, in unison or conflict, happen to
envisage experience at any given time, so the spe-
cial activities of consciousness, typical of religion,
express themselves. Accordingly, difficulties and
doubts, changes and transformations occur, often
cozening the human spirit, and yet bearing witness
to its kaleidoscopic limits, as it struggles to liberate
its dearest aspirations.
These matters must now claim attention at some
length. There never was a crisis when they de-
manded more candour and plain speaking, or sin-
cerer discussion of grave questions, especially before
an audience composed, for the larger part, of those
who, from day to day, are forced into contact with
information, ascertained or in process of consolida-
tion, that traverses some past presentations of
'Christian truth,' rich in sacred association to many,
not least to myself. Nevertheless, nobody need
fear facts; all ought to fear suppositions and ex
44 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
parte pleas, particularly with regard to subjects of
the last importance for a sane view of the deep that
calls unto deep in our common humanity. Afraid
*to face the music' of all that has become incor-
porated in the treasure of knowledge, religion shrivels
easily to superstition. It were surely most perilous
that, confronted with man's profoundest needs, we
should rest satisfied with unevidenced affirmations,
or worse, with opinions erroneous obviously to every-
one who is free to judge. At this good hour, re-
ligion suffers violence far more through misbelief
than through scepticism; nobody mocks Chris-
tianity, thousands jest over the thaumaturgy where-
with too many confuse it. Would, indeed, that we
might pass the cup of these waters of bitterness !
But that is impossible — impossible even were the
conclusion forced irrevocably to those hopeless
terms; "philosophy having become a meditation,
not merely of death, but of annihilation, the precept
know thyself has become transformed into the ter-
rific oracle to QEdipus —
" ' Mayest thou ne'er know the truth of what thou art.' " ^
The scene of proof — and of strife — lies athwart
the strait way to the valley of blessing. Like Job,
^ A Candid Examination of Theism, by 'Physicus' (G. J.
Romanes), p. 114 (3d ed.).
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 45
we answer the Lord, and say, ''Hear, I beseech thee,
and I will speak ; I will demand of thee, and declare
thou unto me." ^ We tempt the Father of Lights,
and in all reverence, because He has left us without
other choice, contemporary knowledge being as
truly a divine revelation as ancient faith. "And he
called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah,
because of the striving of the children of Israel, and
because they tempted the Lord, saying. Is the Lord
among us or not?" ^
It will save misunderstanding, and serve to elimi-
nate qualifications like 'perhaps,' 'but,' 'I think,'
and so forth, if I state at the outset that my aim is to
delineate the perspective, still unfamiliar to a con-
siderable section of the lay public, resultant upon
the entire trend of enquiry in the nineteenth century,
and to envisage the attendant difhculties without
any shirking. In other words, the main tendency of
science and scholarship in our age, in its full rigour
and vigour, rather than this or that restricted set of
conclusions, will pass before us. This is no place
to exhibit the apparatus in detail, and I must reserve
particulars for another occasion. You will under-
stand, therefore, that I am not necessarily in accord
with every inference; I desire only to state the case
* Joh xlii. 4. 2 Exodus xvii. 7.
46 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in such terms that none can mistake its meaning.
If we are caught in a veritable sea of troubles, we
must know at least what dangers threaten.
Unconscious of the strong synthetic and suggestive
pressure exerted by the prevalent outlook of an
epoch, we, even the students among us, tend to for-
get that we gaze upon a recent universe, one con-
cealed largely, if not completely, a brief century since.
Cast the mind's eye back to the era of the Declara-
tion of Independence, or of that mightier cataclysm,
the French Revolution, and what close grip upon
men, organisms, and things do we find? Less than
might be supposed. A mathematical conspectus of
the mechanical relations subsisting between the
molar masses of the solar system, extended by
analogy to a few farther stars, formed the sum-total,
to all intents and purposes. Of the physical state
and chemical constitution of these units next to
nothing had been ascertained intimately. Contrari-
wise, misconceptions or random guesses abounded
in the realms of chemistry, natural history, and
physiology; astounding superstitions concerning
humanity in its most typical achievements — reli-
gion, art, morals, and society; nigh total ignorance
about a possible coherent interpretation of history.
Accordingly, we must recall that, since the dis-
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 47
tinguished victim of the French Revolution, Lavoi-
sier, dethroned phlogiston, the physical sciences —
astronomy, physics, geology, and chemistry — have
undergone extensive transformation. Since Bell
noted the difference between the afferent and efferent
nerves, the biological sciences have come to birth,
and accurate conclusions from controlled observa-
tion have replaced conjectures bred of mere sus-
picion. Since Hegel enunciated the epoch-making
principle, that human experience explains its own
development, and that, otherwise, it is irrational,
whole series of human sciences have been elaborated.
Thus, no matter where we pry, we contem_plate a
universe unsuspected by our forefathers, and com-
mand numerous principles hidden quite from them.
Literally, a new heavens, a new earth, and a new
* all that therein is' salute us. Moreover, whether
we be astronomers or physicists, chemists or physi-
ologists, biologists or psychologists, historians or
philologists, anthropologists or philosophers, we
envisage our several topics from a standpoint identi-
cal in essentials for everyone. Indeed, so far has
this unitary movement proceeded that, for each, as
concerns his special investigations, another view
were well-nigh inconceivable. Yet, when Dalton
was excogitating his atomic theory, just one hun-
48 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
dred years ago, this same view found no applica-
tion outside 'celestial mechanics,' and, even there,
room remained for contradictory possibihties, as was
evidenced by Newton's naive idea, inherited by
Paley's egregious philosophy, that a Being uncom-
monly familiar with the laws of geometry had in-
jected gravitation and inertia into the heavenly
bodies. This compelling apposition, between the
contemporary outlook and that regnant till about
the middle of last century, may be brought to a
sharp point in the statement that, for the former,
the universe is one^ for the latter it always was two.
To us, the universal processes energizing everywhere
supply the primary well-springs of explanation; to
our predecessors, an otiose reference to a somewhat,
neither mind nor matter (or, as we would say, neither
consciousness nor energy) , to a somewhat, therefore,
unknowable ex hypothesi, provided an extra-mun-
dane mystery whereto nearer mysteries might be
traced back. And the m'ore subtle the problems on
hand, the more intricate and elusive their factors,
the more besetting the presence of this tenuous,
pervasive makeshift. To illustrate: 'celestial me-
chanics ' almost excluded it, but in chemistry,
biology, psychology, literature and language, morals
and religion, in an expanding series, opportunity
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 49
offered for the vagaries of supranatural inter-
ference.
How potently this metaphrastic phantasy ruled
may be seen vividly from a cursory acquaintance
with the marvels supposed popularly to offer ade-
quate guarantee of authority in morals, of the au-
thenticity of the human mind, and of the truth of
religion. Take the last, for example ; what a mourn-
ful record appears ! The Ptolemaic astronomy, dis-
torted by geocentric myopia, was made the comer-
stone of Christianity. The divine inspiration of
the Hebrew points was held essential to the preser-
vation of orthodox faith. It was contended that,
apart from literal foretelling by Old Testament
prophecy, the New Testament could not be vindi-
cated. It was asserted, by no less a person than
Wesley, if memory serve me rightly, that the in-
violability of the Christian faith is bound up with a
belief in witchcraft. It was imagined commonly
that man's hope of eternal salvation reposed on the
historical accuracy of the creation myth in Genesis,
and that the certainty of this expectation found
strong credentials in the fable of Lot's wife and in
the tale of Jonah's incarceration in the whale. It
was actually alleged, with perfect sobriety, that the
discovery that the world and man were created by
50 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
the Trinity on October 23d, 4004 B.C., at nine o'clock
in the morning, had essential bearing on the spiritual
life. It was asked, cynically, "Who will venture to
place the authority of Copernicus above that of the
Holy Spirit?" Geology suffered judgement as ''an
awful invasion of the testimony of revelation." It
was maintained, as an important scientific fact, that
because ''death entered the world by sin," there
was no death on earth prior to Eve's fault. It was
insisted that "of all instruments of God's vengeance
the thunderbolt is the chief." Study of physics, as
of medicine and chemistry, was interdicted by
ecclesiastical order "on account of certain sus-
picious novelties." The bones of a goat, suppositi-
tiously those of St. Rosalia, were employed as
fetiches to heal disease, on the obvious ground that
"bodily infirmity frequently results from sin."
Lunacy and hysteria were attributed to the machi-
nations of Satan, and treated accordingly. It was
stated gravely that the Almighty spoke Hebrew,
and that every language originated from this one
at Babel. Numbers taught that the Pentateuch
was dictated to Moses by the Deity about 1520 B.C.,
and affirmed that any other view must be stigmatized
as "a mass of impieties, a bulwark of irreligion."
The probable historical interpretation of the famous
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 5 1
Immanuel passage in ''Isaiah" was dismissed as
"horrible, false, perverse, and destructive." On the
contrary, every scientific statement in the Bible was
described as "infallibly accurate; all its histories
and narrations of every kind are without any inac-
curacy, its words and phrases have a grammatical
and philological accuracy such as is possessed by no
human composition." ^ Baseless dogmas and childish
errors of a similar kind might be adduced practically
without limit ; and, strange to say, all alike — mon-
strous, absurd, or merely silly — have been put for-
ward as foundations or essential portions of ' Christian
truth.' As a matter of fact, so far from having aught
to do with ' Christian truth,' all issued from the precon-
ceived view of the universe as two, the Irish-bull con-
ception of ultimacy, now abandoned by investigators.
According to current conceptions, the universe
ebbs and flows in a single, vast order — of a second
order, incommensurable with this, we know nothing.
It presents itself as a 'closed whole,' explicable from
within on its own terms, never as a broken system
controlled from without by some bruited, but ab-
sentee, designer. Such is the conclusion to which
^ See, for very full details, A History of the Warfare between
Science and Theology in Christendom, Andrew D, White. The
weak point of the book is Dr. White's rather jejune notion of
theology-
52 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
we have been, and are being, driven on all sides by
serried testimony pouring in overwhelmingly from
every scrutiny undertaken by special investigation.
Obviously enough, it imports, not simply a change,
but a complete revision of the ideas we can enter-
tain about religion as, indeed, about anything. No
doubt, a smooth agreement concerning the ways
taken by the process has not eventuated, cannot
eventuate, probably, for years to come. But con-
sensus about the basal fact tends to become more
and more unified. In other words, differ as we
may and do over the means operative in the cosmos,
less and less divergence exists about the attitude to
be adopted towards the universal order. Whatever
conclusions may emerge in a future we wot not of,
certain it is that all who hold convictions respecting
the immense importance of religion must face the
altered situation — and the sooner the better. The
churches, particularly if the laity will rouse and
assert themselves, stand in the shadow of an unex-
ampled problem, as of a unique opportunity. Signs
of the times, so clear that he who runs may read,
indicate a direct, strenuous demand upon them.
It amounts to no less than this — that they bring
Christianity down from the clouds of outworn sup-
position to tabernacle in the common places of our
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 53
sore puzzled workaday life. The religion of unre-
stricted, spontaneous access to God can hardly
retain its propulsive leadership under the handicap
of petrific formulae alien from the most earnest in-
sight of the day, and permeated with imagery too
often crass in its reminiscent paganism.
"And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light,
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly,
But westward, look, the land is bright."
Beyond question, many cherish the conviction
that scientific advance has bereft life of worth and
hope. On the contrary, it is equally clear that num-
bers raise a joyous paean to the victory of 'reason'
over 'superstition.' In proceeding to attempt a
delineation of the case, I shall not forget either ex-
treme. But the root of bitterness will have pre-
cedence.
For the sake of convenience and brevity, it may
be well to adopt the objective classification of modern
knowledge. The ' universes ' of ' things ' and of ' liv-
ing things' group themselves under the title 'science,'
in the narrow sense accepted conventionally. So,
too, the 'universes' of 'self and of 'other selves' fall
together. But this unity exhibits two aspects. On
the one side, it regards man as he has been and is;
54 MODEEN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
from another it contemplates him as he ought to
live, or as he might become. Thus the field of
knowledge so distributes itself that we are bidden
review the situation, first, as ' science ' sees it ; sec-
ond, as it appears from the standpoint of historico-
critical research; third, as it flashes forth in the
ideal spheres of morals and religion. Yet, even
accepting this tripartite division, we must recall
that, in every instance, the unconquerable duality
of human nature — as physical and self-conscious
— produces disturbance and, by consequence, sets
problems of the utmost intricacy, generates fertile
misconceptions.
I. The Scientific Consciousness
It should be noted at once that the tremulous
essays of the early masters — Hipparchus, for ex-
ample — and the refined experiments of a Ruther-
ford and a Ramsay, of a McMurrich and a Morgan,
exhibit no difference in spirit. The contrast hap-
pens to be one of sweep — of the material wherein
scientific method can work victoriously. So, at the
outset, let us take stock of this common spirit.
No recondite observation were necessary to prove
that, in average affairs, the characters of our friends
tend to differ. Putting the matter very synoptically,
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 55
one may affirm that now this, now that, element in
the psychological organization dominates an indi-
vidual. We all know the person whom emotion or,
as often, sentiment masters; similarly, some betray
the primacy of intellect, others of will. Roughly,
these contrasts of psychological expression correspond
to divergent types of reaction upon the most ordinary
events. Social institutions intimate as much. All
members do not subserve the same offices, as an
influential writer saw years ago. "And God hath
set some in the church, first apostles, secondly
prophets, thirdly teachers, then powers, then gifts
of healings, helps, governments, divers kinds of
tongues." ^ Plainly, the aesthetic or emotional, the
utilitarian or practical, and the critical or reflective
temperaments are ever with us, each ministering in
virtue of its special gifts. The last has made the
nineteenth century peculiarly its own, and, for three
generations, has contrived to set its seal upon the
prevalent trend of the age. As its self-set task
would lead one to expect, its habitual spirit presents
little, if any, mystery. Confronted with the tortuous
operations of nature, the scientific consciousness
scents order throughout, and strives to sublimate its
consequent inferences into baldest simplicity. The
^ I Corinthians xii. 2^.
56 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
laws of motion, the kinetic theory of gases, the law
of the tides, the theorems of the conservation of
energy and of evolution are reductions of phenomenal
flurry to very plain routine. Consequences of long,
intimate, and most ascetic devotion, their history
exhibits the attitude necessary to scientific achieve-
ment. Thus certain qualities evince their unabashed
presence invariably. To wit: in the first place,
scrupulous care and unprecedented accuracy. Noth-
ing is too unimportant to be overlooked; no trouble
counts for hardship, so long as review and confirma-
tion continue desiderata; above all, the uttermost
loyalty to fact rules supreme. Secondly, on the basis
of these qualities a certain confidence supervenes,
and receives justification from the gradual rise of a
solid masonry of knowledge. Small wonder ! For,
no matter what one's predilections or prejudices, no
matter what one's hopes, or fears, or desires, con-
clusions drive home with sublime disregard. In the
scientific kingdom nought happens according to man's
wish or will ; everything issues from a dry, intellectual
recognition that thus, and thus alone, the unheed-
ing phenomena take their changeless way. Third,
as a natural sequel, the new coordinations collide
with otiose supposition and unexamined belief.
The stimulus of conflict is generated, fresh material
\
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 57
forces itself within the scope of research, and the
scientific mind presses on to wider inferences. But
transformation involves destruction, and the very
process vitalizes once more many affairs left
for dead or foreclosed. This movement, fourthly,
leads to formulations of hypotheses — everything
cannot be settled in a moment; while hypotheses
demand fresh observations, original experiments,
and more circumspect reflexion. Accordingly, the
scientific spirit displays its transitive qualities in
two main directions. On the one side, by insistence
upon the need for a definite knowledge purged of
mystery and snap-shot opinion, it warns the human
mind against impracticable adventures. On the
other, by its total disregard of fetters forged by sup-
position in the 'ages of faith,' it liberates mankind,
and urges to the analysis of experience in its every
cranny. Baseless authority thus goes by the board,
and all restrictions, confining inquiry to ruts where
* perad ventures ' and prohibitions prevail, vanish
away. Nothing is to be interdicted; nothing can
be too unexpected or unpalatable, provided it pre-
sent itself panoplied with evidence. In a free
atmosphere a rigid methodism builds out its bridge,
with elaborate precaution, over the chasm of the
unknown.
58 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Consequently, as the scientific spirit sees, its
mission is never to conform the cosmos to a logical,
much less to a theological, scheme, but to describe
verifiable connexions, and to recount how these
connexions are maintained as a matter of simple
observation under conditions that preclude sub-
jective disturbance. As Spencer said, in one of his
earliest essays : —
"Considered genealogically, the received theory
respecting the creation of the Solar System is un-
mistakably of low origin. You may clearly trace
it back to primitive mythologies. Its rem.otest
ancestor is the doctrine that the celestial bodies are
personages who originally lived on the Earth — a
doctrine still held by some of the negroes Living-
stone visited. Science having divested the sun and
planets of their divine personalities, this old idea
was succeeded by the idea which even Kepler enter-
tained, that the planets are guided in their courses
by presiding spirits: no longer themselves gods,
they are still severally kept in their orbits by gods.
And when gravitation came to dispense with these
celestial steersmen, there was begotten a belief,
less gross than its parent, but partaking of the same
essential nature, that the planets were originally
launched into their orbits from the Creator's hand.
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 59
. . . While the genesis of the Solar System., and
of countless other systems like it, is thus rendered
comprehensible, the ultimate mystery continues as
great as ever. The problem or existence is not
solved: it is simply removed further back. The
Nebular Hypothesis throws no light on the origin
of diffused matter; and diffused matter as much
needs accounting for as concrete matter. The
genesis of an atom is not easier to conceive than the
genesis of a planet. Nay, indeed, so far from mak-
ing the Universe a less mystery than before, it makes
it a greater mystery. Creation by manufacture is
a much lower thing than creation by evolution. A
man can put together a machine; but he cannot
make a machine develop itself. . . . That our har-
monious universe once existed potentially as form-
less diffused matter, and has slowly grown into its
present organized state, is a far more astonishing
fact than would have been its formation after the
artificial method vulgarly supposed." ^
Free, with complete freedom, to inquire into
anything, man is as completely bound — bound to
abide by discernible testimony. Of such is the
spirit of science.
^ "The Nebular Hypothesis," Westminster Review, July, 1858;
see Essays: Scientific, Political, and Speculative, pp. i, 55-56.
(London, 1863.)
6o MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
What, now, of method? Like every method,
that of science operates negatively no less than
positively. Its exclusions signify not a little. Dar-
win has presented this point with characteristic
frankness.
"By collecting all facts which bore in any way on
the variation of animals and plants under domestica-
tion and nature, some light might perhaps be thrown
on the whole subject. My first note-book was
opened in July, 1837. I worked on true Baconian
principles, and, without any theory collected facts on
a wholesale scale, more especially with respect to
domesticated productions. . . . When I see the
list of books of all kinds which I read and abstracted,
including whole series of Journals and Transactions,
/ am surprised at my own industry. I soon per-
ceived that selection was the keystone of man^s suc-
cess in making useful races of animals and plants.
But how selection could he applied to organisms living
in a state of nature remained for some time a mystery
to me^ ^
The initial requirement of scientific method might
be summed in the phrase, self-extrusion. To dis-
cover what the object is, apart entirely from faintest
hint about what it might be, or from what expecta-
^ Life and Letters, vol. i, p. 83; the italics are mine.
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 6l
tion might make it — this is a law of the Medes and
Persians. ''Nothing happens, it comes." So the
questions, What comes ? How does it come ? How
is it maintained in this way rather than that ? reach
no unclouded solution unless the observer so con-
trives as to eliminate admixture of self. The inde-
pendence of the natural order forms a necessary
postulate. Hence — and here lies the significance
of the intimation — the scheme of things must be
taken on its own recognizances. What you may
think of it, apart from, or in addition to, its self-
ordained march, counts not a whit. This becomes
very obvious in the region of experiment. Little as
the layman may appreciate the fact, the great diffi-
culty of the experimenter is, not to plan experiments,
but to bring them under such thorough control that
he can dissolve them into their simplest concomitant
elements. For, while experiment spells interference,
primary analysis implies that the factors work thus
and so without human interposition. Science, that
is, enforces continual self-criticism as the prime
requisite of a reliable method.
/"Having insured this negative virtue, positive
procedure is in order. Everybody knows that
scientific research circles round observation. But
observation means many things. For instance, it
62 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
reckons with first-hand knowledge only. / have
seen such and such, / have noted this and the other,
or, as a vivid colloquialism puts it, 'I have been
there.' What artists call atmosphere must have
been evaporated. In satisfactory observations the
objects must stand out clear-cut and raw — precise,
unmistakable results alone avail. No provision
can be allowed for 'almosts' and 'possibles.' If
doubtful matters emerge, and especially if they
persist, the aid of colleagues must be invoked, so
that personal equation may disappear. Here we
light upon another characteristic. Certainty rests
on the rock of caution. Professions of ignorance,
recognition that, for the present, even bare facts
stay suh judice, form constant accompaniments of
eventual success. And this means, further, that
the real investigator loves no phenomenon more
than another. Before the tribunal of the ascertain-
able all facts have permission to tell their own tale
in their own way. Science discourages attempts to
put a premium upon selection of evidence to bolster
any conclusion, however desirable. It were almost
superfluous to add that, when we pass from mere
observation to that intensified species of observation
known as experiment, the greater instability of the
conditions calls for superlative exercise of the pre-
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 63
cautions just enumerated. The laboratory has re-
placed Nature to a large extent, but only because it
offers a short-cut to Nature. It enables us to save
time, we need not wait for the leisurely dame to act.
It places us in position to repeat phenomena in-
definitely, and it puts within reach very accurate
estimates of cooperant circumstances. Again, ap-
paratus does not exist for the purpose of construct-
ing experiments, as the layman supposes often. On
the contrary, it is nothing but a means for the ex-
tension of our senses, as by the seismograph; for
immense increase in their delicacy of discrimina-
tion, as by the microscope; or it enables them to
affect us in strange ways, as by the pseudoscope;
or it insures an accuracy unobtainable otherwise, as
by instruments for automatic registration. More-
over, laboratory methods and equipment help us to
isolate and examine special constituents of a process,
to plot the factors of a phenomenon, as it were, and
thus to obtain mastery, piecemeal, over its ramified
detail. In total effect, then, experiment originates
schemes for overcoming and combating human
limitations, physical and psychological. But its
veritable revelations are received under the same
stringent tests that rule direct contact with Nature,
nay, under conditions even more stringent, because
amenable to the forethought of control.
64 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
The facts garnered under these safeguards, in-
terpretation follows. Here we unveil another pro-
cedure, one of analysis and classification principally.
As before, the phenomena dictate. That is, the
assembled data raise difficulties of identity, simi-
larity, difference, and contrariety; and the crucial
measures of combination into groups demand atten-
tion. These hazardous excursions through the
accumulated records serve often to disclose dis-
crepancies, or even to evoke factors which had
escaped previous notice. To scientific method even
the slightest divergence acts as a danger-signal. The
cry is, 'Back to the facts,' or the query is raised,
'What strange thing are they telling us now about
themselves?' More than likely, the situation will
call for a minute analysis. It may be necessary to
proceed from the complex, supposed simple, to the
simpler still, in order to find how disturbance origi-
nates, what it betokens. This regress, like the
difficulty of dissolving experiments, constitutes one
of the most exacting practical problems that scien-
tific method has to face. But, difficulty or no
difficulty, the old fideHty to fact, the precision, the
caution, are to be maintained only with sterner
rigour.
By consistent use of this method, the scientific
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 65
consciousness reaches definite results. The common
phrase 'natural law' labels one kind of inference;
the less familiar, and often misunderstood, term
'hypothesis' proclaims another. At present, scien-
tific inquirers disagree about the nature of ' law,'
more particularly with regard to objective neces-
sity or validity, and I cannot enter upon the grounds
of quarrel here. Suffice it to say, they involve a very
intricate problem beyond the competence of science,
and that two views, the 'materialistic' or 'realist,'
and the ' agnostic,' receive support. The older con-
tention appears plainly in the following statement : —
"A Force is a Power which initiates or accelerates
aggregative motion, while it resists or retards sepa-
rative motion, in two or more particles of ponder-
able matter (and possibly also of the ethereal
medium) .
"All particles possess the Power of attracting one
another — in other words, of setting up mutually
aggregative motion — unless prevented by some
other Power of an opposite nature. Thus a body
suspended freely in the air is attracted towards the
earth by the Force (or aggregative Power) known as
Gravitation. A piece of sugar, held close over a
cup of tea, attracts into itself the water of the tea-
cup, by the Force (or aggregative Power) known as
Capillarity. A spoon left in tea grounds or a foot
planted on the moist sand similarly attracts the
66 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
neighbouring drops. A piece of iron or coal ex-
posed to free oxygen (each at a certain fixed tempera-
ture) attracts the particles of oxygen by the Force
known as Chemical Affinity. In every case there
must be an absence of counteracting Energies (or
separative Powers) sufficient to prevent the union
of the particles: . . . every particle attracts every
other particle in some one of various ways, unless
prevented by other Powers." ^
Evidently, Allen laboured under the impression
that 'law' existed in an external world, and there-
fore that it could or did lead man into the precmcts
of essential reality. That is, natural law might be
viewed as a 'thing' governing other 'things' and,
by consequence, as offering a key to the constitution
of being. On this interpretation, nature and mech-
anism become convertible terms, for we know causes
in substantial existence. On the contrary, many
contemporary leaders affirm that a 'natural law'
cannot count for more than a symbol.
"A natural law, therefore, is not implied in the
conformity of the behaviour of the energies, but this
conformity is rather conditioned by the uniformity
of our modes of conception and is also partly a
matter of good fortune." ^
^ Force and Energy, a Theory of Dynamics, Grant Allen, pp. 5-6.
2 Popular Scientific Lectures, Ernst Mach, p. 175 (Eng. trans.,
Chicago, 1895).
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 67
" All principles single out, more or less arbitrarily,
now this aspect, now that aspect, of the same facts,
and contain an abstract summarized rule for the re-
figurement of the facts in thought. . . . Cause and
effect, therefore, are things of thought, having an
economical office. ... In nature there is no law
of refraction, only different cases of refraction. The
law of refraction is a concise compendious rule,
devised by us for the mental reconstruction of a
fact, and only for its reconstruction in part, that is,
on its geometrical side." ^
Summarily put, these positions imply that we
provide ' laws of nature ' by formulating uniformities
of sense-perception. No 'law' is poised 'out there.'
Our 'awareness' is solely of successions and co-
existences of relations in a universal motion. If we
agree, as we may easily, that science furnishes no
ground-plan of the foundations of knowledge, but
gifts simply a procedure for the dispersion of ig-
norance, we shall have mediated between the two
views to some extent. For, after all, a law, as un-
derstood in both, amounts to a generalized statement
of observed uniformities, nothing more. And, as
the actual observations fall short of totality, in the
nature of the case the conclusion imposes probability
^ The Science of Mechanics, Ernst Mach, pp. 83-84, 485-486
(Eng. trans., 2d ed.).
68 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in various degrees. The instant we travel beyond
this record, we quit the region of scientific stability.
Again, hypotheses must be described as reflective
extensions of ascertained fact.^ A hypothesis forms
the antecedent of any judgement which hangs upon
an *if.' The consequent must needs be constructed
from phenomena accessible to practical observa-
tion. For instance, I find myself unable to account
for certain phenomena in the dispersion of light.
Then, on the basis of careful observation, I declare,
* If a molecule be a heavy mass, connected by mass-
less springs with a massless shell, then these observed
phenomena come within the bounds of the explicable.'
But the relative credibility of the antecedent hy-
pothesis depends upon its relation to the consequent,
and this, once more, is built from the facts encoun-
tered by me in the routine of observation. Evi-
dently, then, the results of scientific method, whether
laws or hypotheses, fall to be classed as interpreta-
tions of his experiences by a being for whom they
occur thus and not otherwise. In short, they belong
to the intellectual realm, liberated as completely as
may be from every reference to desire (emotion) and
will (wish).
^ Cf. Modern Electrical Theory, Norman Robert Campbell,
especially p. 231.
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 69
Finally, what consequences emerge, as concerns
the present subject? They present themselves in
two guises — practical and theoretical. On the
practical side, an impassable gulf separates the
temper of science from the temperament of religion.
By a steadfast instinct, the religious man refers in-
variably to a 'cause,' or causes, capable of explain-
ing much more than stands in scientific question as
a usual rule. By acquired discipline the investigator
of nature either rejoins, *I cannot understand what
you mean,' or answers, with decision, *I find no trace
of any such cause amid the phenomena I have ob-
served.' In other words, for him the phenomena
explain themselves from within, and, beyond this,
no opinion can be passed upon them; he has been
cured completely of —
" that insomnia which is God."
When Galileo's judges decided that —
"The doctrine that the earth is neither the centre
of the universe nor immovable, but moves even
with a daily rotation, is absurd, and both philosoph-
ically and theologically false, and at the least an
error of faith," ^
their evidence consisted of preconceived dogmas
(proven untrue since), and of an appeal to faith,
^ Congregation of 22d June, 1633.
70 MODERN TI-IOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
without pertinence in the ranges of physical re-
search. Nothing could well seem further removed
from their method than, for example, the astro-
physical enquiries of the contemporary astronomer.
And, if the practical test be applied, the result leaves
no room for doubt. The propositions of the Prel-
ates and Cardinals do not work; those, say, of the
Director of Lick Observatory do. Nevertheless,
religion and science remain integral to life equally;
therefore a large discrepancy must lie secreted
somewhere.
When we uncover the theoretical consequences,
the precise nature of the situation begins to loom up.
The conjunct enquiries of the sciences converge on
the decision that the universe is a single, if extraordi-
narily ramified, system of energy. At all events, we
gather this inference from observation and experi-
ment, no matter in what field. Not only so, we can
and do deduce it from the most stable and authentic
principle yet compassed by the human mind, — the
dynamical generalization, outlined by Newton, and
clinched since, in numerous unanticipated ways, by
many others. Moreover, energy provides an ulti-
mate to which everything else may be reduced.
Starting, then, from this base-line (the most care-
fully and accurately surveyed that we have, remem-
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 7 1
ber), What follows? Adapting an ancient affirma-
tion, the final judgement formulates itself thus : the
heavens declare the glory of Newton and Kirchhoff,
the earth showeth the. handiwork of Helmholtz and
Darwin. One epitome of the cosmos goes glimmer-
ing, another illuminates the firmament, full-orbed.
At this late day it were superfluous to point out
that these doctrines are not synonymous with ma-
terialism, for materialism has been relegated to the
bottomless limbo of epistemological discards. Nev-
ertheless, they intimate, with no uncertain sound,
that nature presents itself as a self-explanatory
totality. Even in the tenuous region of mind,
natural causes are found to suffice for natural
effects. As Huxley said, science means " the gradual
banishment from all regions of human thought of
what we call spirit and spontaneity." ^ When
European culture had accustomed itself to the
Copernican astronomy, no one objected to the sub-
stitution of mechanical law for supernatural design,
so far as the stars in their courses were concerned.
And the same story, substantially, can be related
about the direful discoveries of geology and biology
in the course of last century. The folk who assev-
^ On the Physical Basis of Life, Collected Works, vol. i, p. 159
(London, 1893).
72 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
erated that ''the principle of natural selection con-
tradicted the revealed relation of creation to its
Creator," laid Darwin at Lyell's side in the hallowed
fane twenty-two years later. And, in our own
persons, a similar movement has operated to vaster
issues after another lapse of a quarter century.
Educated men, at least, agree to accept natural
explanations, not only for foreign objects in the
stellar offing, but, through the offices of chemistry,
physiology, and biology, for the nearest intimacies
of their own flesh. Nay, not content with these
triumphs, science has essayed a bolder step. The
evolution hypothesis has laid hold upon the dis-
tinctively spiritual organization. Psychology, for
instance, and anthropology in its festooned rami-
fications, proceed upon a naturalistic basis no less
confidently than the sciences of 'external' nature.
Huxley's affirmation, if a statement of fact in his
day, bears the semblance of a prophecy to us. For,
materialism, thrust from the front door of the
scientific edifice with mighty clangour, has been
succeeded by a new tenant, smuggled in quietly at
a side entrance — one like-minded, if less disagree-
able. Naturalism is in occupancy.
Now Naturalism pivots fundamentally upon the
doctrine of evolution, nay, upon the doctrine of
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 73
evolution interpreted in one way, and therefore
committed to the exclusion of certain competitive
views. Drawn synoptically, the position may be
outlined thus: the most complex phenomena of
nature are reducible to simpler, these to still simpler,
until, at length, one arrives at bed-rock in determina-
tions of motion, capable of synthesis and retention
in mathematical formulae. For psychology, —
"The soul and its faculties, the great entity and
the small entities, disappear, and we have to do
only with internal events, which as sensations and
mental images translate physical events, or which,
as ideas, movements, volition and desire, are trans-
lated into the physical events. . . . Psychology is
connected again with the laws of life and with its
mechanism." ^
For the sciences to which physiology is basal, the
most careful investigators —
"see no grounds for accepting a vitalistic principle
that is not a physico-causal one." ^
Thus, —
"when we attempt to think out what the organiza-
tion is, we almost unavoidably think of it as a struc-
ture having the properties of a machine, and working
^ German Psychology of To-Day^ Th. Ribot, p. 8.
' Regeneration, Thomas Hunt Morgan, p. 287.
74 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in the way in which we are accustomed to think of
machines as working." *
Again, —
''During the last twenty years the relation between
the transformation of matter and energy has played
a prominent part in physiological research. . . .
Robert Mayer and Helmholtz announced the prin-
ciple of the conservation of energy and regarded its
applicability to the human organism as an axiom.
Recent investigation has done notable service in
proving this axiom with certainty. It was demon-
strated, in the case of animals at rest, that the heat
given out was exactly equal to that of the combus-
tion of the substances assimilated in the body
(Rubner). . . . After having resolved the simpler
problem of determining the transformation of
energy in the resting body, the more difficult task
of measuring this transformation during work was
undertaken. By modification of the above-indicated
methods one is now able to find out precisely how
much nourishment the animal organism must use
if it is to perform a definite amount of mechanical
labour.
" American investigators, Atwater, Benedict, and
their fellow-workers, have recently, in a very complete
way, followed the transformation of matter and
energy in man, under various conditions of nourish-
ment, and occupation. The respiratory calorimeter
^ Regeneration, ThOmas Hunt Morgan, p. 281.
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 75
which they constructed is the most perfect machine
that has hitherto been devised for the study of the
transformation of matter and energy in living animals.
With these investigations concerning the amount
of matter and force needed by man and beast in
various work, together with the study of the most
efficient foods, the physiology of nutrition enters
into hygienic and sociological questions of the great-
est significance." ^
Or, as our foremost American authority. Professor
Jacques Loeb, holds, instincts have developed out
of reflexes, thinking out of instincts; thus, as bio-
chemical research seems to prophesy, the whole
problem of human thought will be explained finally
in terms of physical chemistry.
And so the incomplexity — by comparison — of
chemistry and physics is reached, and we find our-
selves dominated thoroughly by the mechanical the-
ory, the most abstract, and therefore the most work-
able and accurate, of all human generalizations.
Consequently, in the last analysis, every research
yields to a resolution "als Mechanik der Atome."^
Throughout the entire welter of phenomena, this
^ The International Quarterly, vol. xii, No. 2, pp. 327-328,
Nathan Zunz {The Progress of Physiology).
^ Cf. Die Willenshandhcng, Hugo Miinsterberg, p. 9, and
passim.
76 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
account suffices, whatever our religious views ; and we
abide by it implicitly in practical affairs, — in en-
gineering, in dietetics, in the regulation of public
health, in domestic plumbing, and so on. The me-
chanical theory is over all our works. The uniformity
of nature, widening ever as research blazes its labori-
ous trail, seizes fresh phenomena and affords such
explanation as is attainable under the inexorable
circumstances. For our present subject, the gravity
of the conclusion can scarcely be exaggerated, be-
cause, if it hold, ' Christian truth,' in any con-
ventional codification of it, has fallen upon
irremediable bankruptcy.
Nakedly set forth, the theory comes to this. Ob-
servation and experiment, as conducted under rigid
conditions in the natural sciences, combine to show
that the universe is to be adjudged unalterably a mech-
anism. The human body, on the current reading
of evolution, cannot be regarded as other than a bit
of this mechanism, while consciousness sinks to the
level of an ' epiphenomenon,' a side issue, of the
nervous system. So all the activities, segregated
from the purely physical world traditionally, under
the term 'self -consciousness,' take their places among
the other facts of nature. No break asserts its
presence. This granted, every vestige of ' Christian
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 77
truth ' disappears, a more completely baseless fabric
of a dream never sprang from fond, unchastened
imagination. Even if aspiration be allowed some
free play, as a kind of charity, the utmost comfort
available to ease the sombre burden of life simmers
down to that neo-Stoicism taught openly now in
several quarters.
"Brief and powerless is man's life; on him and
all his race the slow sure doom falls pitiless and dark.
Blind to good and evil, reckless of destruction, om-
nipotent matter rolls on its relentless way; for Man,
condemned to-day to lose his dearest, to-morrow
himself to pass through the gate of darkness, it
remains only to cherish, ere yet the blow falls, the
lofty thoughts that ennoble his little day; disdaining
the coward terrors of the slave of Fate, to worship at
the shrine that his own hands have built; undis-
mayed by the empire of chance, to preserve a mind
free from the wanton tyranny that rules his outward
life; proudly defiant of the irresistible forces that
tolerate, for a moment, his knowledge and his con-
demnation, to sustain alone, a weary but unyielding
Atlas, the world that his own ideals have fashioned
despite the trampling march of unconscious power." ^
At the moment, it is none of my affair to attempt
adjudication upon the adequacy, much less the truth,
^ Ideals of Science and Faith, p. 169, Hon. Bertrand Russell
{An Ethical Approach); edited by the Rev. J. E. Hand.
78 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of these systematic inferences. Rather, my point
is taken thus: they proclaim a crisis that admits of
no half-measures, of no paltering in any shape.
Confronted thus, as we are, it were worse than useless
to rehearse hoary propositions formulated at a time
when other possibilities engaged mankind; it were
mere folly to fold one's hands, so to speak, and indulge
a soporific hope that, somehow, all may end well.
These things do not lie on the lap of the gods, they
happen to be human issues, amenable to human
influences, and to none other. As a matter of plain
fact (forgive me for reminding you once more),
western civilization accepts the concatenation of
phenomena, whence such views have precipitated,
at every turn in practical life. Your railroads and
trolley cars, your telegraphs and telephones, your
hospitals and laboratories, in brief, the thousand
things that constitute the very possibility of all that
you term civilization, were created by the devotion of
many who, in loyalty to their own insight, feel con-
strained to these positions. Moreover, as concerns
knowledge itself, on the theoretical side, the average
man agrees to-day that the astronomer and physicist,
the chemist and physiologist, the biologist and physi-
cian, the psychologist and philologist, have earned
the right to speak with authority. The old-time
I
THE WATERS OF MERIBAH 79
scribes have met their Waterloo, as many recognize,
if in dazed fashion. Or, to put the case otherwise,
science has become such an enormous power in the
most ordinary affairs of existence, and no less in the
circumambient perspective wherein we set the import
of our lives, that it were fatuity to suppose ourselves
able to disregard even its extremest pronouncements.
To adopt its advice when useful or pleasant, to pass
it by on the other side when it constrains or seems
distasteful, is a course closed to the reflective mind.
That numbers have availed themselves of this sub-
terfuge during the past generation throws no lustre
on human perspicacity. That an evasion so obvious
can continue, the trend of the intellectual events
from day to day shows, decisively, to be out of the
reckoning. To use a homely phrase, 'you can't eat
your cake and have it.' Either you must capitulate
at discretion eventually, or you must be prepared
to reconsider, de novo, the place of religion in ex-
perience. The naive simplicity of orthodox belief,
so called, has gone beyond recovery. Disaster or
not; mental innocence has eaten of the tree of the
knowledge of good and evil at the hands of science.
This, at a minimum, stands beyond question.
Whether, on the other side, naive heterodoxy has
proven itself a defensible consummation is an entirely
8o MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
different affair. In any event, it serves itself now
as a philosophy of the universe; despite its multi-
plied placards, erected in warning against 'metaphys-
ical quagmires,' it parades, not merely as a meta-
physic, but as a metaphysic of a highly dogmatic type.
We may say, therefore, ''Thou hast appealed unto
Caesar; unto Caesar shalt thou go." ^ But, mean-
time, this appeal releases nobody from the obligation
to recognize the immense change frankly, to become
familiar with its basis, factors, and logic.
^ Acis XXV. 12.
4
4
LECTURE III
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE
Even if he admit the validity of scientific
method, and appreciate the sweep of the scientific
view of the universe, the dogmatic Christian may
yet exclaim, " Our withers are unwrung ! " Un-
doubtedly, he may allege that the natural sciences,
while paramount in affairs pertaining to the physical
world in its widest scope, cannot deal with spiritual
life. He may remind himself that affection, and
devotion, and worship elude mathematical formulae,
are intractable to causal relationship, and, more
than likely, evade the grasp of mechanical, chemical,
or physiological characterizations. Nay, as matter
of record, religion has continued to maintain itself
inviolable against the assaults, say, of materialism
in the mid-nineteenth century, by a more or less
conscious affirmation of this very argument. The
average man cannot be expected to realize that the
weapon cuts both ways, that it is as dangerous to
the user, religion, as to the intellectual constructions
attacked. Therefore we may admit the plea for the
G 81
82 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
moment. But, when one comes to historico-critical
research and its conclusions, no such extenuations
avail. History and criticism stand on the same
plane with religion. They deal with self-conscious-
ness, proceed from it. In short, the breaches they
effect are ''breaches of the house," not merely devas-
tations, perilous, maybe, but perilous afar. Here,
then, we must anticipate an internal assault, one from
which no easy way of escape offers. If science
threaten, history and criticism seem in a position
to command.
II. The Historico-Critical Movement
As its title implies, the historico-critical movement
belongs to that most modern group of investigations
known generally by the name ' human ' sciences.
From the earliest times till within recent years, the
activities typical of mankind were sequestered from
exact enquiry. " Order, Heaven's first law," appeared
to be set at defiance by the multifarious chances of
society, morals, art, and religion. Myth, legend,
and marvel found congenial environment here, be-
cause they alone sufficed to bridge yawning gaps;
while supposition, no matter how far-fetched, did
duty for objective fact as concerned phenomena
so rooted in the recesses of psychological peculiarity
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 83
that the resources of intelligence were foiled. Thus
mystery cloaked human doings on all sides, and even
the most penetrating scientific minds were nowise
loath to admit that the universe was dual — a natural
order expressing itself without variableness or shadow
of turning, and an inward spirit, flashing forth with
caprices so strange that suprahuman intervention
became a regnant postulate.* But, in the wane
of the eighteenth century, several thinkers, especially
in Germany, began to suspect that diligent study
of the past might "lead into the council chamber of
fate," to use the words of Herder, in whose seminal
works, "Folk Songs," "Ideas on the Philosophy
of History of Mankind," and "God, Friendly Con-
versations," this suspicion crystallized into something
like system. Hegel, the only philosopher whom
modem Europe can place beside the masters of
those who know, — Plato, Aristotle, and Spinoza, —
articulated Herder's suggestions, and, since his death,
in 1 83 1, thanks mainly to his epoch-making fer-
mentum cognitionis, supplemented by that of Comte
in France, an extensive group of expert investigations
has concentrated upon the elusive theme. Anthro-
pology, archaeology, philology, in their numerous
ramifications, the historical disciplines, and allied
^ One of my, own teachers, the late Lord Kelvin, countenanced
this position.
84 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
studies have torn the veil of mythology from man's
past, and taught us to regard his present as part of
a vast self-developing order. We have learned that
all articulated knowledge is science, that operative
principles can be discovered, not merely in the physi-
cal universe, but even in the most unlikely corners
of the psychological realm. In a word, the trans-
formation of possible views concerning humanity
is almost more profound than the parallel reversal
in the natural sciences.
The barest description of a field so immense is
quite beyond my competence. It may help, however,
if I attempt to illustrate the general process by refer-
ence to a single case with which, in all likelihood,
you possess some acquaintance — I mean the civili-
zation of ancient Greece.
When the foremost classical scholars of the day
were schoolboys, Greece enjoyed a comparatively
brief history, as history counts now. Moreover,
she seemed isolated in exceptional fashion, and her
sudden cultural efflorescence was a perennial wonder.
The Homeric poems were conceived, and rightly,
as legends in romantic form, dating back probably
between the eleventh and eighth centuries B.C.
Full of picturesque traditions and enthralling story,
even their most vivid descriptions could not be verified
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 85
historically. As products of poetic imagination they
were magnificent, unparalleled; as reminiscences of
an actual civilization they implied little, and served
only to engender speculations impossible to check.
Indeed these speculations flourished luxuriantly.
But, after 1870, Greece gained even more reality
than she had possessed hitherto. The discoveries
of the temple and halls of Olympia, by Curtius and
his colleagues, injected fresh Hfe into the glorious fifth
century. At Pergamon Conze uncovered the colossal
work, such as the wonderful altar, characteristic
of Hellenic genius after Alexander the Great. Mean-
while, almost in the twinkling of an eye, the mythical
Greece of Homeric legend was set before an astonished
world. From 1870 to 1885 the remarkable and mani-
fold discoveries of Schliemann, at Hissarlik, Mycenae,
Orchomenos, and Tiryns successively, revealed the
existence of a complex prehistoric culture, ante-
dating the Homeric poems by four centuries or more.
While it may be doubted whether Schliemann re-
covered the grave of Agamemnon and the treasure
of Priam, or explored the house of Atreus, it is true
that he bared the palaces of Homeric rulers, and
that he compelled the reconsideration of the course
of civilization in what was to become ' Greece.' In
any event, the end was not yet. The French ex-
86 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
cavations at Delphi, the Jerusalem of Greece, those
of the Americans at the Argive Heraeum, the met-
ropolitan shrine of pre-Homeric times, served to
whet expectation, to dissipate some difficulties, and
to create others. Nor is this all.
Writing about twenty-five years ago, in full ac-
quaintance with SchHemann's larger results, one of
the most judicious historians of Greece said : —
"Another example of the influence of imagination
on the form assumed by early history is furnished
by the personality of Minos. In Homer he is a son
of Zeus. . . . Hesiod makes him rule with the sceptre
of Zeus over many men dwelling around him. . . .
Herodotus makes Minos rule over the islanders. . . .
According to Thucydides, Minos was the first king
who possessed a fleet of war. . . . We hold, on the
contrary, that Minos is a mythical personage, like
Perseus and Heracles, and that the actions which
are ascribed to him as history are nothing but a
gradual accretion of legendary embellishments. We
might just as well look upon his colleague ^Eacus as
a historical personage, and commend his mild rule
over his people." ^
Yet, as the first months of the twentieth
century dawned, an English investigator^ found,
* History of Greece, Adolph Holm, vol. i, pp. 49-50 (Eng. trans.).
^ Dr. Arthur J. Evans, Keeper of the Ashmolean Museum,
Oxford.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 87
in Crete, marvellous evidences of a great empire,
based on sea power, over which this same Minos
ruled.^ The Homeric tradition, that Minos
lived before Agamemnon, like some of the other
traditions mentioned by Holm, received unforeseen
conj&rmation. The palace at Knossos, let alone
numerous other discoveries, at Zakro, Palaikastos,
Praeses, Mount Ida, Mount Dicta, and Vapheio near
Sparta, raise problems of the most acute interest,
bring much prehistoric mystery to the light of open
day, and make it possible to initiate enquiry into
what may come to be termed '^gean' civilization.
As with Schliemann, so here, it may not be true
that Dr. Evans has found the storied Labyrinth
and tracked the awful Minotaur to his familiar
haunts, or wandered in the palace of Alcinous. But
he may have set back a civilization to which ''we
are justified in applying the name Greek" ^ to a
period 3800 B.C., that is, relatively as early as our
knowledge of Egypt; nay, he may have furnished
warrant for the inference that primitive man made
his home here at a time when the Sumerians were
^ I do not imply that a Minos was historical, of course ; the name
is possibly a title, like Caesar, or, like Creon, may mean simply a
ruler. On Crete as a 'world-power,' see Les Pheniciens et VOdys-
see, Victor Berard, vol. i, pp. 225 f.
2 A. Furtwangler in the International Quarterly, vol. xii, p. 109.
88 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
founding their city on the Persian Gulf. However
this may turn out ultimately, the ascertained facts
afford plenteous surprises. A modem lavatory and
drainage system, examples of the goldsmith's art
unrivalled except by the Italian craftsmen of the
Renascence, plaster work fit to stand comparison
with the sculpture of the classical age, achievements
in porcelain so excellent as to suggest connexion
with the idealized plaques of the shield of Achilles,^
numerous intaglios graven finely with various mon-
sters, a system of weights and money, clever miniatures
on crystal, mural paintings of tribute bearers, — all
point to a forceful empire, pulsating with intense life,
far away in the mists of a dim antiquity. The palace
of its monarchs, as now excavated, taken with the
accessories found there, may well render the
famous passage in the ''Odyssey"^ no romantic
legend, but rather a memory of an impressive fact ;
while the paved Theatral Area cannot but recall the
dancing ground "such as once in spacious Knossos
Daedalus fashioned for Ariadne of the braided hair."^
^ Iliad, xviii, 478 f. ^ viii, 83 f,
3 Iliad, xviii, 590 f. The first building at Knossos is striking
in its non-Hellenic character; the Cretan palace is a labyrinth of
rooms, the Northern (or Hellenic) Megaron is one-roomed; at
Mycenae and Tiryns, for example, the two styles are found in
combination.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 89
Who these Minoans, master-builders and rare
artists, may have been, scholars are not yet clear.
Their work intimates at least that Periclean art was
no fatherless sport in the ^Egean environment.
Moreover, their religion offers pregnant hints, full of
intricate problems. It centred round the cult of a
female divinity, evidently a nature-goddess, and
therefore associated with fertility.^ With her an
obscurer being, a god, was worshipped, and held in
regard sometimes as her son, sometimes as her hus-
band. This collocation, so strange to us, at once
suggests the parallel of Ishtar and Tammuz, with its
very remote goddess-mother and long retinue of per-
sistent myths. Traces of fetich worship, kindred
with the Semitic, exist also. The trilith, or sacred
portal, at Goulas, the asherahs and massebas, the
sacred doves and dovecote, the tree cult, must
compel further enquiry and, at length, serve to extri-
cate some questions intractable now. And so the
problem of the relation between Minoan and Semitic
culture becomes urgent, especially if, as some were
formerly wont to think, S argon of Agade never saw
the "Upper Sea." Can the one enable us to under-
stand the other better ? Did they come into contact ?
if so, how and when, and how intimately? If not,
^ She was also the queen of wild beasts.
90 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
what comparative results can we extract from analysis
of the respective cults ? Again, can it be maintained
that Phoenician art was no more than Minoan in a
decadent stage? In view of Dr. Evans's 'library'
from the palace, containing about one thousand
tablets, written in a clear script, which antedates
Phoenician writing by five centuries, what are we to
say next of the settled opinion that assigns the Greek
alphabet to Phoenician sources? Was an Indo-
European language the medium of communication
in the i^gean basin during the Minoan supremacy ? ^
When scholars acquire the key to the Knossos tablets,
shall we be able to close the gap between Eastern and
Western civilization so called ? What is the relation
of the Minotaur to the Hittite god (Sutekh ?) standing
on a bull? What about the double-headed axe of
the Cretan Zeus and the same weapon of the Hittite
Amazon priestesses, the traditional founders of
Ephesus ? Did Crete give Zeus to Greece, or do we
only find very primitive elements in the worship of
the god, throwing light, possibly, on his origin ? ^
How did Zeus-worship evolve from that of the
* It is well to recall that the names Larisa, Zakynthos, Arisbe,
Narkissos, and the like are not Greek.
^ 'Zeus' may be merely a late conventional way of naming the
Cretan bull god.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 9 1
Nature-Mother? Can we trace a parallel evolution
of Yahweh?
In like manner, the brute-headed men on the
Minoan seals, although they present affinities with
Babylonia, refer one immediately to Egypt. And the
same problems arise. Whatever may be the final
consensus of scholarship as to details, it is probable
that the Cretan excavations have disclosed a civiliza-
tion of Oriental, rather than Occidental, temper.
Minoan culture belongs with the Near East, not with
western Europe, even if its cursive script may yet
conceal much. It may be, for example, that the
Cretan empire builders and the ancient Libyan race
of Egypt are of common stock. If so, then we must
look for the roots of Greek civilization in Africa!
Now for our present point. 'iEgean' culture as
Asian (or African) is a startling idea to those of us
who have been taught time out of mind to consider
Greece the bulwark of European salvation from
'barbaric' eastern conquest. Nay, our boyhood
tradition hails from Plato : ''We are pure Hellenes,"
he says,^ "having no admixture of foreigners, and
therefore the hatred of the barbarian has passed
unadulterated into the life-blood of the city." These,
and similar discoveries, serve to show how a priori
^ Menexenus, 245.
92 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
theories and speculative possibilities must yield to
transformation in face of new knowledge, and give
way before transitive rearrangement of familiar, but
misunderstood or obscure facts.
cv^This resurrection of the past forms but one of many
triumphs wrought by the 'human' sciences these
last three generations. Sumerian, Babylonian, Ela-
mite, Hittite, Assyrian, Egyptian, Chaldaean, and
Persian overlordships, to say nothing of the civiliza-
tions peculiar to the Far East, have paraded before
our rapt gaze. And we realize, for the first time,
that the history of human culture presents itself as a
long, slow process amenable to explanation from
within. We elicit the meaning from the facts, not by
reference to a presumed supranatural interference
from without. The respective attitudes of research
and ignorance are nowhere better illustrated than by
Dr. Evans's own account of his discovery of the splen-
did fresco, the "Cupbearer," at Knossos.
"In carefully uncovering the earth and debris in a
passage at the back of the southern Propylaeum there
came to light two large fragments of what proved
to be the upper part of a youth bearing a gold-
mounted silver cup. The robe is decorated with a
beautiful quatre-foil pattern; a silver ornament
appears in front of the ear, and silver rings on the
arms and neck. What is specially interesting among
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 93
the ornaments is an agate gem on the left wrist, thus
illustrating the manner of wearing the beautifully
engraved signets of which many clay impressions
were found in the palace.
" The colours were almost as brilliant as when laid
down over three thousand years before. For the
first time the true portraiture of a man of this mys-
terious Mycenaean race rises before us. The flesh
tint, following perhaps an Egyptian precedent, is of a
deep reddish brown. The limbs are finely moulded,
though the waist, as usual in Mycenaean fashions, is
tightly drawn in by a silver-mounted girdle, giving
great relief to the hips. The profile of the face is
pure and almxOst classically Greek. This, with the
dark curly hair and high brachycephalic head, re-
calls an indigenous type well represented still in the
glens of Ida and the White Mountains — a type
which brings with it many reminiscences from the
Albanian highlands and the neighbouring regions of
Montenegro and Herzegovina. The lips are some-
what full, but the physiognomy has certainly no
Semitic cast.^ The profile rendering of the eye shows
an advance in human portraiture foreign to Egyptian
art, and only achieved by the artists of classical
Greece in the early fine-art period of the fifth cen-
tury B.C. — after some eight centuries, that is, of
barbaric decadence and slow revival.
^ It may be noted that the purest type of the Semite is the
Arabian, and that type does not correspond to the one generally
suggested by the word * Semite,' viz. the Jew and Assyrian.
94 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
"There was something very impressive in this vision
of brilliant youth and of male beauty, recalled after
so long an interval to our upper air from what had
been till yesterday a forgotten world. Even our
untutored Cretan workmen felt the spell and fascina-
tion. They, indeed, regarded the discovery of such
a painting in the bosom of the earth as nothing less
than miraculous, and saw in it the 'icon' of a
Saint ! The removal of the fresco required a delicate
and laborious process of underplastering, which
necessitated its being watched at night, and old Mano-
lis, one of the most trustworthy of our gang, was told
off for the purpose. Somehow or other he fell asleep,
but the wrathful Saint appeared to him in a dream.
Waking with a start, he was conscious of a mysterious
presence; the animals round began to low and neigh,
and 'there were visions about'; '(^az^rafet/ he said,
in summing up his experiences next morning, 'the
whole place spooks.'"^
^ The Monthly Review, March, 1901, pp. 124-125. In the
number for January, 1901, of the same magazine, see Mr. D. G.
Hogarth's article on The Birth Cave of Zeus (pp. 49 ff.). Further
details, in articles by these authors, and by Messrs. F. B. Welch
and Duncan Mackenzie, are to be found in the Journal of Hellenic
Studies (London), especially vols, xxi and xxii; also in the Annual
of the British School at Athens. The most convenient synopsis
of the whole subject, with the literature complete to date, is offered
in The Discoveries in Crete and their hearing on the History of
Ancient Civilization, Professor Ronald M. Burrows (London,
1907).
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 95
Dr. Evans embodies constructive criticism, Mano-
lis naive presupposition.
Accordingly, we may now ask. What is the his-
torico-critical attitude? On the historical, side, this
point of view teaches that man's spiritual life pre-
sents an organic whole, governed by immanent
principles peculiar to itself. Culture-history thus
discloses its secret in an unbroken series of manifes-
tations and, wherever the import of the process has
been penetrated, a self-controlled unity has afforded
satisfactory clews. No doubt, the differentiating
principle that interpenetrates all continues to defy
deepest plummet. To assert that its "stream of
tendency" is 'necessary,' reduces the mystery not a
whit. Nevertheless, we seem to see at least that the
sole medium of the revelation is man himself. To
adopt Tieck's phrase, civilization (in the sense of
culture) possesses "its own centre, its own soul, as it
were, from which the controlling spirit penetrates
all parts, even the most remote." To reconstruct
this synthetic activity is the aim of historical method.
And, so far as the perplexing task has attained suc-
cess, history has reconstituted itself, because it has
proved to be a self-propelled growth. Thus, on the
side of its larger setting, the historico-critical method
turns out to be philosophical, and "is an endeavour
96 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
to import unity and connexion into the scattered
directions of cultural thought, to follow each of these
directions into its assumptions and into its conse-
quences." ^
The critical factor of the process differs little in
temper and procedure from any other kind of sci-
ence. In a word, it must be classed with ordinary
inductive knowledge. By application of the inductive
method to languages, literary documents, monuments,
objects of art, pottery, traditions, and the like, con-
trolled effort is put forth to elicit what they have to
tell about themselves. The Egyptian monuments,
the cuneiform inscriptions, the Vedas, palimpsest
Mss., Thucydides's ''History of the Peloponnesian
War," Xenophon's "Memorabilia," the contents of
the New Testament, and so on, yield information
about themselves whereby we arrive at a definite
grasp upon what they were and imply. In all cases
alike the same standards and processes apply. Thus
scholars essay to set the materials in their real rela-
tions and, by a consecutive system of checks and
balances, to reduce them to consistency with them-
selves and one another. In this manner they place
men in a position to guard themselves against mis-
conception, or naive inference, and deliver them
^ Grundziige der Logik, H. Lotze, sec. 88 (ist ed.).
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 97
from the substitution of preconceived belief or opin-
ion for objective fact. As a result, explanation pre-
cipitates itself from within the circle of the evidence,
and extraneous interference becomes a superfluous
hypothesis. The analytic exhibition of origins and
concomitant conditions enables the expert to pass
from individual cases to a synthesis of principles that
holds valid universally for similar phenomena. The
corrupt Hebrew, the imaginary history, and the apoc-
alyptic fiction of Daniel, for example, prove the
book a product of the Maccabaean epoch, just in the
same way as Plato's language, and the development
of his technical doctrine, throw light upon the order
of the Dialogues. The exhibition of sources, that
is, leads to an elucidation of credibility, scope, and
significance. Pelops and Cadmus were the ancestors
of the Greeks precisely as Abraham and Jacob of the
Israelites. We have no more reason to believe that
Plato took down the sayings of Socrates on the spot,
and transcribed them in the 'Socratic' Dialogues,
than that the Synoptists performed a like office for
Jesus. Above all, both problems are to be settled
by the exercise of identical discrimination, by the use
of the same standards — there happens to be no other
way. Results may diverge widely in detail, exactly as
they do in the natural sciences, but the method of
gS MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
approach and the attitude before the evidence must
remain unchanged for all cases equally.
"No Tyrian trader from the world shall hoard
His splendour for salvation, no dismay
Shall rant on flame-bursts, nor to element
Resign the soul ! But something of a faith
In understanding of a modem mood
Shall mean God most in complications sprung
Of fluxion, spring-life and the lift of earth
Inevitable. And my theme shall be . . .
Let the new creed afford right meaning for
The creed rejected, let the new art show
Old myth subordinant, old metaphor
But outworn fact: thus, the new fact full truth.
No sceptical dismay
More, nor withdrawal from the market-place
And sphere of high contention faith with faith !
Here is earth's wonderful sweet market-place
Of blossoming contention — ' would my soul
Had learn'd herself so as a world of men ! ' "
We see, then, that the historico-critical movement
is not encompassed with any sort of mystery. It
amounts to an attempt on man's part to master the
meaning of his own past by reference to principles
that reach formulation only on the basis of exact
inquiry, and complete loyalty to the canons of ordi-
nary experience. Trace the phenomena to their
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 99
historical origins, follow out their life career, and it
will be found invariably that they suffice to sys-
tematize themselves; the rest is conjecture. The
identity, mutatis mutandis, between the relations of
the 'Powers' of the Near East in the time of the
Tel-el-Amarna "Letters," and those of the European
'Powers' in our own day, is almost laughable. But,
till criticism exploited the "Letters," and history
drew the unavoidable inferences, this knowledge
failed us.^
The materials, then, are, on the one hand, prob-
lems to be solved ; on the other, ideas to be appre-
ciated. The results garnered wield moral influence
chiefly ; they are calculated to impress the will by al-
tering one's attitude towards the enthralling drama
of history. Nevertheless, as contrasted with the sci-
entific consciousness, the historico-critical movement
has remained more or less ^^ caviare to the general,"
and for evident reasons. It depends upon evidence
difficult to glean, and still more difficult to master,
so as to be able to interpret it. It appeals to fluid
qualitative judgements rather than to practical (and
therefore simple) quantitative standards. Most of
^ An excellent description of the historico-critical method is to
be found in vol. i of The Hexateuch, by J. Estlin Carpenter and
G. Harford-Battersby (London, 1900).
lOO MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
all, the social mind has never associated it with a
rough-and-ready theory of the universe which, on
account of its evident, if profound, implications for
life, obtains widespread attention in print designed
specially for the popular eye. And yet, as I have
said, its thrust into the traditional views of religion
is more radical by far. Let us look at this for a
little, concentrating attention upon the biblical
narratives and documents.
I. Ancient History
At the outset it is imperative to realize that we must
slough all ideas of chronology, and of the pivotal
importance of the "seed of Abraham," traceable to
dogmatic opinions about the 'books of Moses.'
According to these delusions, a period of 1656
years intervened between the Creation and the Flood,
of 290 years between the Flood and the birth of
Abraham, of 720 years between the birth of Abraham
and the Exodus — 2666 years altogether. Adam,
and the other worthies who peopled these two and a
half millennia, were conceived to be historical person-
ages as a matter of course; nay, more, their careers
were moulded by a tendency that proceeded from
Yahweh in a series of special revelations. The Deity
interposed directly, from time to time, to promote
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE lOI
the welfare of Israel; in short, the universe was cre-
ated with particular regard to Israel's mission ; univer-
sal history circled round this vocation ; all else was
subordinate. We are aware now that, while these
pious recitals may serve to edification, their historical
conspectus is totally untenable. The Creation, a
sinless Adam in Paradise, the Fall, the confusion of
tongues, and the rest, may remain passing good folk-
lore ; they never happened in the course of culture-
history. The chronology, that is, has no basis in fact,
while the glamour that surrounds Israel amounts to a
freak of late fancy playing upon legends relative to
a mythical past. The truth, so far as ascertainable,
tells a very different story.
Take a map of western Asia and northeastern
Africa, place a pair of nut-crackers upon it so that
the hinge lies on the Gulf of Issus; now move the
right-hand leg till it passes beyond the eastern shore
of the Persian Gulf, covering Susa; move the left-
hand leg till it coincides with the Nile valley and
covers Thebes. The territory enclosed by this base-
less triangle includes the biblical lands. Next, keep-
ing the hinge steady, bring the right-hand leg down
sharply, move the left-hand leg slowly about an inch
— the line of pressure and contact will coincide with
Palestine. The one movement indicates the fre-
102 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
quent and rapid incursions into Palestine from the
Euphrates-Tigris valley, the other the more leisurely
and less frequent invasions from Egypt. Further,
as compared with the sweep of the extended legs, the
narrow line of junction denotes the relatively small
geographical extent and importance of the Prom-
ised Land. It is a tiny thing, squeezed continually
between world-empires. Even for the brief period
under David and Solomon, when the consolidated
Israelitish territory became rather larger than
Massachusetts, and when its 'world-power' ran from
Kadesh and Damascus in the north to Beersheba
and, possibly, Elath, on the Gulf of Akabah, in the
south, it was never equipped to compete on equal
terms with its mighty neighbours. Moreover, an
Israel bounded on the north by Kadesh and Laish,
on the south by Gaza and Rabbath Moab, was an
ideal rather than a reality, the short time of Davidic
prosperity aside. Indeed, so rapid was the decline
after the blaze of glory that attracted the Sabaean
queen, and enabled Solomon (as opinion still runs) to
marry a Pharaoh's daughter, that, in 750 B.C., Israel's
territory measured but one hundred miles from
north to south, seventy-five from east to west; while
little Judah, the eventual heir of the apocalyptic
tradition, included just fifty square miles. What
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I03
could they do against Assyria, or Babylon, or Egypt,
against empires ruling, sometimes, 230,000 square
miles of the richest country in that world? Little,
except as their powerful enemies fell upon weakness,
as in the days of Jeroboam II, or of the Hasmonaeans,
when "the yoke of the heathen was taken away from
Israel."
This reversal of perspective regarding temporal
importance finds parallel at least as transforming
when we come to questions of chronology and the
history of culture. It seems a far cry to the dawn of
the Christian era. The obscure migration — one of
several like it — whence the legendary personality
of Abraham was precipitated, runs back from the
first Christian century just about the same period as
we date forward from it. And yet the exquisite
silver vase of Entemena, the priest-king of Lagash, in
southern Babylonia, transports us to a time nineteen
hundred years before the Abrahamitic migration.^
Nevertheless, even Entemena was a modern man, if
we grope to the first settlement of Eridu, the city of
the god Ea, by the Sumerians, some 6500 b.c.^
^ Cf. Explorations in Bible Lands, H. V. Hilprecht, p. 241.
^ Cf. Babylonians and Assyrians; Life and Customs, A. H. Sayce,
p. 2. Professor Sayce's date is based upon the rate of alluvial
deposit in the Persian Gulf from the time of Alexander. It should,
I04 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Nay, when we quit history for myth, the Babylonian
calculations put the bibhcal to utter shame. From
the Creation to the Deluge ten kings reigned for
432,000 years; from the Deluge to the Persian con-
quest was an astronomical period of 36,000 years.
But, without trenching upon myth, or calling atten-
tion to the remarkable correspondence of the Baby-
Ionian figures with the conclusions of modern science
as to the age of man upon earth, the bare facts furnish
food enough for reflexion.
The people known to us as the Hebrews belonged
to the Semitic stock which, as recent investigation has
proved, played a foremost role in the development
of human culture. While it is difficult to formulate
the divisions of the race in a manner entirely satis-
factory, any one of the several arrangements adopted
by scholars serves to show wide extension, exceptional
vitality, and primary importance. Thus, for ex-
ample, the North Semites fall into four divisions,
viz.: (i) Babylonian (Old Babylonian, Assyrian,
Chaldaean) ; (2) Aramaean (Mesopotamian, Syrian) ;
(3) Canaanitic (Canaanites, Phoenicians) ; (4) He-
braic (Hebrews, Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites).
perhaps, be stated that Eridu is said to have been on "the shore
of the sea" in the reign of Dungi, son of Ur-en-Gur, cir. 3000.
Cf. Orient. Lit. Zeitung, 1907, S. 583.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I05
There were three groups of South Semites, viz,,
(i) Sabagans, (2) Ethiopians, (3) Arabs.^ The for-
tunes of the Hebrews form part and parcel of Semitic
civihzation as a whole, and at a late period, compara-
tively, in its development. So much so that, if we
recall the picturesque story of Joseph, we must recog-
nize many waves of migration from Arabia, not merely
in subhistorical, but also in prehistoric, times. With
these the '' chosen people" were intertwined inex-
tricably, and they formed no exception to a very
general rule. Causes operative elsewhere, and on a
much larger scale, suffice to explain the recorded
phenomena, when they have any historical basis.
The course of events prior to the Exodus of Hebrew
tradition may be outlined as briefly as possible.
Apart from a general view of it, one cannot realize
the import of later history and, very specially, adjust
the focus.
Old Babylonia was settled in remote days by a
non-Semitic people, the Sumerians. They were city
folk, and the city appears to have been the unit of
government. The principal settlements of this pre-
historic age were Eridu, on the Persian Gulf, Ur,
some forty miles west on the Euphrates, and Nippur,
^ Cf. History, Prophecy, and the Monuments, James Frederick
McCurdy, vol. i, p. 19.
Io6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
about eighty miles northwest, near the centre of the
plain between the Euphrates and Tigris. When the
first Semitic hordes migrated to this region is not
known. At all events, in farthest historical times,
and earlier, a Semitic culture had blossomed here
already, and the Sumerians had become incorporated
in a civilization which, though influenced profoundly
by the older race, was Semitic in general character.
From this cosmopolitan culture the first great empire
of western Asia came forth. So early as S argon of
Agade, Palestine ranked with other Babylonian prov-
inces. His son, Naram-Sin, obtained, amongst other
spoil, a vase of Egyptian alabaster, itself indicative
of the extent of his conquests. Nor was it a crude
civilization that penetrated to Palestine thus early.
S argon's gem-cutters produced specimens of their
art equal to the best work of later periods, and the
bas-relief portrait of Naram-Sin rivals, if it does not
surpass, the familiar masterpieces of Assyria two
millennia after. Religion and law, government and
commerce, had made distinct advances. Art had
reached high development. The arch, so indispen-
sable to large archievement in architecture, and sup-
posed usually, until a recent date, to have been in-
vented by the Romans about looo B.C., was used in
Babylonia nearly 3000 years before this time. About
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I07
2700 B.C., when Gudea was priest-king of Lagash,
with Ur-Nina of Ur as suzerain, we find Palestine
still under Babylonian domination, and this relation
seems to have existed for at least two hundred years
more. Then followed a second Arab migration,
known as the Amoritic, which overflowed Hither
Asia (including Palestine), South Arabia, and,
possibly, Egypt. In 2225 B.C., we find a Semitic
Pharaoh (Khyan) — a "lord of the desert," or chief
of Beduin. These Amorites appear to have been
absorbed by the populous Babylonia and Egypt, but
in Palestine they maintained themselves as a separate
people. After the disintegration of the Babylonian
government resultant upon this incursion, the moun-
taineers of Elam, to the northwest of the Euphrates-
Tigris plain, who had doubtless suffered chastisement
at the hands of their more progressive neighbours,
saw their opportunity, and attacked the wealthy
lowlanders, sacking Nippur, and scattering destruc-
tion among the monuments of a civilization that had
already wielded overlordship for the same period as
Christianity has now ruled the Western world. The
much disputed fourteenth chapter of Genesis may be
a Palestinian reminiscence of this raid; if so, the
emigration of Abraham was an incidental phenome-
non in a widespread movement. But the Elamites
Io8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
had to reckon with the Canaanite or Amorite invaders
who thus preceded them. For from them sprang
a dynasty whose main ornament was the famous
juridical monarch, Hammurabi. According to the
latest calculation, he reigned about 1900 B.C., that is,
seven centuries before the Exodus. Under him
Babylon became the metropolis of western Asia, and
entered upon her wonderful career as the holy city of
this vast region. As some think now, not Jerusalem,
or Rome, but Babylon, was "the mother of us all."
Hammurabi not only redeemed the old empire from
the Elamite yoke, but restored its supremacy to the
shores of the Mediterranean. It can hardly be
doubted that some of the legislation to be found in
the "Book of the Covenant" (Ex. xx. 22-xxiii. ;^;^;
xxxiv. 11-26) was related closely to his great code,
graven upon the black diorite pillar now in the
Louvre. The dominion of Babylonia, thus rein-
augurated by Hammurabi, was destined to last for
four centuries. That Palestine prospered during
this period, became, in fact, the " land flowing with
milk and honey," we know from the Egyptian
"Romance of Sinhuit." Agriculture and commerce
flourished, civilization was accordant.
Yet a third migration brought this period to an
end, when the Kassites, a Tartar-like people from
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE lOQ
central Asia, broke through Elam, and founded a
dynasty in Babylon. In the same epoch a non-Semitic
race, the Mitanni, carved out a kingdom on the head-
waters of the Euphrates, and thus cut off Babylonia
from her trade routes with western Asia. Syn-
chronous with these movements was the successful
invasion of Egypt by the Shepherd or Hyksos kings,
who were Asiatics — possibly Semites, and who held
rule in Palestine, after some sort, ere they over-
whelmed Egypt, if Numbers xiii. 22 is to be cred-
ited. It is within the bounds of possibility that the
eponyms of the Exodus set out upon their wanderings
in this era, as a wavelet in the general unrest. The
net result, as concerns the present theme, was the
decline of Babylonia, whose commerce waned, and
the rise of Egypt, to freedom first, then to world-
empire, after she had expelled the hateful foreigners.
With Thebes as base, the seventeenth dynasty began
the Hundred Years' War which, under Aahmes, the
founder of the eighteenth dynasty, resulted in the
final rout of the Hyksos. If contemporary records
run true, the defeated Shepherds retired into Pales-
tine. The Egyptian monarch was compelled to pur-
sue as a matter of mere prudence, and, eventually,
his countrymen gained an Asiatic empire to the
Euphrates plain. This was achieved by Thothmes
no MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
III (1493 B.C.), the mightiest of the Pharaohs, whose
rule, assured at the battle of Megiddo in northwestern
Palestine, extended over Upper and Lower Egypt,
through the Sinaitic Peninsula and Palestine as far as
Coele-Syria, thence south and east, including the old
kingdom of Agade and Hammurabi, to the borders of
Elam. Egyptian governors were placed in the con-
quered provinces, to render administration perma-
nent. Thothmes died two hundred years before the
Exodus, and his rearrangement of the civilized world
maintained itself for a century. Later antagonists of
Egypt, like the Hittites and Assyrians, are on friendly
terms with Amenhotep III, as the Tel-el-Amarna
'* Letters" show. These letters, moreover, reveal the
amazing fact that Babylonian civilization had become
so engrained in Hither Asia that its language and
script were the media of communication between
educated people, and the sole proper form for diplo-
matic correspondence between rulers. Not only the
dwellers in the Euphrates-Tigris district, but the
Hittites, Canaanites, and even the imperial Egyptians
themselves, employ it. It stood to this period and
provenance as French did to eighteenth-century
Europe, and communication in the ancient epoch
appears to have been as frequent, regular, and
easy as in the modern. An excellent postal ser-
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE III
vice, conducted probably by Beduin, was in
existence.
Religious dissension overtook Egypt in the next
reign, and thereupon her power suffered decline.
The Hittites descended upon Syria from the Taurus,
and the Khabiri (probably another migration from
Arabia) threatened Abd-khiba, the official who
governed Jerusalem for the Pharaoh. The Hittite
king, Sapalulu, made himself supreme to the north of
Palestine, while Moab and Ammon, the ''children of
Lot," came to bear rule in the southeast. Notwith-
standing this pressure from two sides, the Canaanite
strongholds in central Palestine seem to have main-
tained themselves intact — a fact full of meaning.
The fourth migration, the Aramseic, must be con-
nected closely with the biblical legends of the pa-
triarchs and their involuted domestic relations. This
state of disorder in Palestine was ended by Sety I
(1345 B.C.), v/ho reduced the country to vassalage
once more, carrying his conquest as far as Lebanon.
His son, Rameses II, the most famous of Pharaohs,
continued this policy, and came into conflict with the
Hittites. After twenty years of indecisive fighting,
both powers negotiated a solemn treaty of alliance
whereby Palestine remained to Egypt, Syria to the
Hittites. Having married the daughter of Khate-
112 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
sera, the Hittite monarch, Rameses spent the remain-
der of his long reign in cultivation of the arts of peace.
He blossomed into a great builder, using forced
labour, like all Oriental potentates, and, in this con-
nexion, took his place in biblical quasi-history as the
''Pharaoh of the Oppression." When the "mixed
multitude" of slaves — barbarians, as the Egyptians
deemed them — fled into the desert, we do not know ;
no details survive that suffice to throw any light upon
the subject. But over and over again we must em-
phasize the fact that it is only at this point in the
tremendous panorama that Israel makes its first
appearance on the stage, not of history, indeed, but
of direct tradition. Whatever the Exodus may have
been historically, the conditions for its occurrence
eventuated between 1250 and 11 90 B.C., when Egypt
lay in a condition of civil anarchy. The shepherds
of Goshen, if they moved, left during this period,
and their descendants, several generations later,
arrived eventually in a land which had been highly
civilized for two thousand years, and had undergone
already a series of vicissitudes as dramatic as any
that were to follow.
Finally, about this period 2i fifth, and wholly differ-
ent, migration took place. Driven from their main-
land homes on the coasts of Asia Minor and Greece,
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE II3
and probably from the iEgean Islands, by northern
foes, these non-Semitic people fell upon Egypt,
swarmed overland to Syria, or came by sea to the
Palestinian coasts. This displacement may have
synchronized with the final destruction of Minoan
civilization in Crete. In any event, the Philistines,
cast upon the shores of Palestine by it, were not an
indigenous race, and it is at least an interesting specu-
lation that they may have been descendants of the
master-builders of Knossos. To this invasion the
dissolution of the Hittite empire was due. In Egypt
the intruders were unsuccessful, for Rameses II
defeated them at sea off the Phoenician cities. Hav-
ing thus secured herself, Egypt withdrew from inter-
ference in Palestine for two hundred and seventy-five
years.
Evidently, then. Hither Asia had waxed very old
ere Israel threw itself upon the southeastern limits of
Palestine, so recently attacked on the west by the
Philistines. And, be it noted, the entire history to
this point, its awe-inspiring scale and its invocation
of gods innumerable notwithstanding, has presented
no abnormal, non-human, or supranatural features.
Is there any reason to suppose that a sixth, and minor,
migration of Arab nomads will not remain amenable
to ordinary historical causes and racial characteristics?
114 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
2. The Old Testament
Having thus tried to realize that Old Testament
times form but a fragment of Semitic civilization, to
say nothing of ancient civilization as a whole, and
that, according to present knowledge, the customary
exclusion of this consideration results in a false per-
spective, with its indefensible exaggeration of an
episode, let us turn now to the Hebrews themselves.
Confronted with the history of Israel, we discover
at once that a grave disadvantage besets us. To
those who have bestowed little or no attention upon
the matter, the reason may well occasion profound
surprise. In the nature of the case, the records that
present the history of Babylonia, Egypt, and Assyria
are the veritable originals for the most part. Further,
they are often contemporary with the events related.
Deeds from the offices of the great Babylonian bank-
ers, the Egibi firm, and of their earlier colleagues, the
house of Murashu, at Nippur, are in our hands,
signed, sealed, and delivered on the occasions of the
transactions which they detail. Besides, we are
aware that editing in Babylonia —
" was done with scrupulous care. Where a character
was lost in the original text by a fracture of the
tablet, the copyist stated the fact, and added whether
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE II5
the loss was recent or not. Where the form of the
character was uncertain, both the signs which it re-
sembled are given. Some idea may be formed of the
honesty and care with which the Babylonian scribes
worked from the fact that the compiler of the Baby-
lonian Chronicle, which contains a synopsis of later
Babylonian history, frankly states that he does 'not
know' the date of the battle of Khalule, which was
fought between the Babylonians and Sennacherib.
The materials at his disposal did not enable him to
settle it." '
On the contrary, if Abraham be chosen as the
starting-point, and if he were a contemporary of
Hammurabi, Israelitish history runs more than
eleven hundred years ere we come upon contempo-
rary records approximately. And, when historical
times are reached, the documents reveal interested
editing ; not, indeed, the childish, vainglorious boast-
ing of some Egyptian regal monuments, but a subtle
evaluation, maximizing here, minim.izing there, and
designed to produce a certain impression about the
facts, not to reproduce the facts themselves. Briefly,
a theory has been formulated, and by its authority
the facts were adjusted. To overcome this prodigious
initial difficulty has been one main task of modern
scholarship. Small wonder! For, "over a thou-
1 Babylonians and Assyrians, A. H. Sayce, p. 53.
Il6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
sand years separate our earliest Hebrew manuscripts
from the date at which the latest of the books con-
tained in them was originally written." ^ Strange
irony of fate, not to say strange oversight of an om-
nipotent God respecting His own special revelation,
that the official seals affixed to letters by the bureau-
cracy of Sargon of Agade should have come down to
us, while documentary evidence of, say, the ' prophe-
cies' of Isaiah is ''no earlier than the ninth century
after Christ!"^ The fortunes of these precious
works are known more or less generally from about
270 A.D. ; prior to 200 B.C. conjecture reigns, becom-
ing more and more vague as the years recede. What
would we not give to-day for any portion of the Old
Testament as it left the hands of the writer, especially
if he could have shown something of the care be-
stowed by the Babylonian scribe? So, instead of
indestructible monuments, what have we?
"There is one book of books that is generally re-
garded as the most suitable of all for general and
constant reading, the very best book: this is the
Bible. Few books, however, prove so conclusively
as does this that the bulk of mankind cannot read at
all. The so-called Old Testament comprises, as is
^ Our Bible and the Ancient Manuscripts^ Frederick G. Ken-
yon, p. 35 (3d ed.).
2 Ibid.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE II7
well known, all that is left to us of the ancient Hebrew
literature of a period of 800 years, together with some
few books in Greek. It includes writings of the most
various value and the most various origin, which
have come down to us with text edited comparatively
recently, often corrupt and marred in addition by
endless copying, writings ascribed as a rule to men
who never wrote them, nearly all difficult to under-
stand, and demanding extensive historical knowledge
in order to be read with the smallest profit." ^
Yet on this record, and often in ignorance or mis-
apprehension of its nature, scope, and import, many
would still have us stake our hope of salvation !
The Old Testament becomes unintelligible inevi-
tably if, as is habitual, one mistake it for a mono-
graph. Evidently it ought to be viewed as a library,
the collected and edited remains of a literature origi-
nated by a ''peculiar people" throughout a millen-
nium. To unravel and systematize its historical
relations is therefore an indispensable preliminary
to any conclusion about its message and fundamental
value. At present we must confine ourselves to a
brief survey, directed chiefly to appreciation of the
general situation and its results.
At this point it were well to recall that the patri-
^ Georg Brandes, in the International Quarterly ^ vol. xii, pp.
278-279 (1906).
Il8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
archs are legendary beings; that the story of Abra-
ham's eventual migration to Egypt may be due,
possibly, to editorial misconception — the place
mentioned may be in the Sinaitic Peninsula, far
removed from Egypt; that, as yet, we have no evi-
dence of Israel's sojourn in Goshen; that, in any
case, the Israel of David never could have been there,
and that, therefore, the popular idea of the Exodus
has no foundation in fact. Granted that the 'Exo-
dus' took place about 1230 B.C., the remanent
literature affords little or no record of events (myth,
legend, and song aside) for a period of about four
centuries; while the great age of composition falls
in the 350 years between 750 and 400 B.C., subse-
quent, that is, to a national consciousness of a special
mission, in the interest of which the literature is
enlisted, and the more ancient fragments embellished
or reconstructed. Needless to say, this transitive,
doctrinaire standpoint, were it not so evident, would
render evaluation almost impossible. Fortunately,
such slight pains have been taken at concealment that
it affords positive aid. In other words, the literature
could not have come into existence in its present form
till after the national consciousness had crystallized,
at least in the minds of the leaders. Accordingly,
it has proved possible to map the main outlines of a
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE II9
most tortuous process. The pivotal date is 621 B.C.,
when the Deuteronomic Law was ratified and en-
forced by Josiah. So, for the present illustrative
purpose, it may sufiice to consider the literature till
Josiah.
:^. By the unobservant manner in which he reads the
Bible, the plain man justifies Brandes's assertion
quoted above. Even in the English version, the Old
Testament bristles with evidences of composite
origin, yet few seem to take heed. The contrast
between the two creation-myths in Genesis i and
ii can hardly escape notice. But how many of you
have observed such points as the following? What
is the meaning of the inconsequential stuff in the first
four verses of Genesis vi ? That is, what has been
cut out deliberately ? Psalm xlv stands alone in the
psalter; evidently it is a royal epithalamium. In
Isaiah a break occurs at the fourth verse of the
tenth chapter, and another at the end of the twelfth
chapter. In Joshua xix. 47 and Judges i. 34 the
same political condition is sketched. The hymn
in I Chronicles xvi. 8-36 is extracted from the
one hundred fifth, ninety-sixth, and one hundred
sixth Psalms. In Joshua vi two accounts of the
fall of the walls of Jericho have been welded ; and the
same holds true of the story of the Egyptian plagues
120 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in Genesis vii. 14-xi. 8. In Joshua xv. 13-19, 63;
xvi. 1-3, 10; xvii. 1-2, 8-18, we have a representa-
tion of the conquest of Canaan by individual prowess;
even Joshua himself is the leader of the Joseph clan
only, not of a united Israel ; that is, the main stand-
point of the book as a whole is contradicted. Simi-
larly, though now in a theological as contrasted with
. a historical context, the sacrificial verses at the end of
the exquisite fifty-first Psalm traverse the spirit that
has touched the song to such fine issues. Or, to take
but one other example, have you ever tried to separate
thetwo self-contained, but mutually exclusive, stories
of Joseph's sale into Egypt ? (Genesis xxxvii, xxxix-
xl.) According to one tale, Joseph's brethren hate
him, because he has visions which foretell his superior-
ity. When he visits them at the grazings, they decide
to kill him. Reuben dissuades them, and they cast
him into a disused cistern, whence Reuben expects to
rescue him privily. Midianites steal him away, and
sell him to Potiphar, the governor of the prison. Here
it is his duty to act as attendant upon two privileged
prisoners. He tells their dreams for them, and asks
them to remember him with Pharaoh, informing the
'butler' that he has been stolen from his homeland.
According to the other tale, Joseph's brethren hate
him, because he is the favoured son, who has received
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 121
a gannent significant of princely rank. When he
visits them at the grazings, they decide to kill him.
Judah dissuades them, and they sell him to a group
of Ishmaelites. The Ishmaelites sell him to an
anonymous person in Egypt, who has a wife. For the
sake of Joseph's god, Yahweh, this person prospers.
The wife slanders Joseph, and he is thrown into
prison, where, thanks once more to Yahweh, he ingra-
t'ates himself with the governor. Plainly, two legends
hcve been united here, and both cannot be true.
Th^se examples, then, may serve to indicate the
com].osite character of the documents as they have
descended to us. And, when we come to consider
the liten' ture before Josiah, this fact assumes para-
mount imj.ortance.
In the first Dlace, the larger portion of the material
is anonymous. The authors of the following are
known, viz. : Amos, Hosea, Isaiah i-xxxvii
(but chapters xii. 2--xiv. 22; xxi. i-io; xxiv-xxvii;
xxxiv-xxxv were wnten subsequent to Josiah),
Nahum, Micah i-vii. 6, Habakkuk, and Zeph-
aniah. For the rest, we are forced to conclude
that the documents present the most complex
character. Myth and legend in the form of epos,
song, hero-saga, fable, proverb, precept, folklore,
primitive custom, clan and domestic law, rhapsody, —
122 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
all contribute their respective shares.^ Lost collec-
tions, like the Book of Jashar and the Book pf
the Wars of Yahweh, are quoted. Throughout,
evidences of compilation, readjustment, and repeated
revision abound. At the same time, it has been
discerned, after laborious examination, that these
literary phenomena offer no exceptional or unparal-
leled features. Consequently, historical criticism,
in the hands of its most accomplished exponents, he's,
been able to reach certain definite findings. FOr,
all things considered, one can agree that "the battle
over the Old Testament is as good as ended.'*
Opinion may, and does, differ about many ^letails;
for example, was the ashera a tree or p^»le, or a
goddess? But, on the broad general ''jtline, the
conclusions are accepted even by co^iservative in-
vestigators. The cumulative nature of the evidence
admits of no other result.
The remainder of the early literature, then, con-
sists, in the main, of three c'.ocuments, known re-
spectively as the Jahvist, the Elohist, and the
Deuteronomist ; the last belongs to the period of
Josiah. During the exile, a fourth author, the
^ Students of the Old Testament would do well to compare
similar phenomena in the Iliad, e.g., the famous catalogue of
ships, the injuries wrought by the gods in bk. v (385 f.), and
the long interpolations from the Corinthiaca in bk. vi.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 1 23
Priestly Writer, interposed; and, posterior to the
exile, there was a final redaction of the whole material,
from a standpoint akin to that of the Priestly Writer.
As always, the older records excel in spontaneity.
While it cannot be said that "J" (the document
which uses the name Yahweh for God) and " E"
(which employs the term ''Elohim") accord com-
pletely in outlook, they do not fall under the domi-
nation of an elaborate theory, like the Priestly
W^riter. More than aught else, they regard religion
as a natural incident of human life, whereas their
successors suffer from self-consciousness of its divine
institution, and spread through exclusive channels
of revelation. Besides, the redactors attain to
authorship in the current sense of this term; their
predecessors are rather reporters (of story-tellers
and rhapsodes) , or collectors of material that was still
fluid in oral tradition. Thus, it is easy to distinguish
the Deuteronomist and the Priestly Writer from ''J"
and "E," difficult to separate "J" from "E," some-
times impracticable.
The material grouped in these two earliest docu-
ments, which may be said to date from 850 to 750 B.C.,
in their first unified forms respectively, often goes
behind them, refers to very different situations, of
which few accurate details are now recoverable, and
124 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
is certainly of most unequal value. But, on the whole,
and throughout, we find ourselves in an atmosphere
controlled by imagination. Poetry, not historical
truth, dictates the norms. Not till Israel had actually
won foothold in Canaan, can it be said that history
tends to replace tradition. For example, the stories
of the Creation and the Flood are myths, pure and
simple ; moreover, they pertain to the Semitic race,
not to the Hebrew moiety of it. In the passage con-
taining Lamech's 'Song of the Sword' (Gen. Iv.
19 f.) we have obviously a very primitive tale, and a
fragment of admirable poetry. Lamech's sons are
represented as the fathers of all nomadic shepherds,
musicians, and workers in iron. How this could be,
if all perished in the Flood, except Noah, the farmer,
the writer takes no notice. Attracted by the poetry,
he is satisfied to adopt the folk tale. The ' Song of
the Weir (Num. xxi. 17) introduces another ancient
fragment, which a people livi^ig in settled society
could scarcely appreciate. Of a different character
is the 'Triumph Song' of Deborah and Barak
(Judges v). Here we have a paean of victory that
may well revert to a historical occurrence during the
first invasion of Canaan. Of the same kind are
David's 'Elegies' over Saul and Jonathan (2 Sam. i.
1 7 f .) and on Abner (2 Sam. iii. ^^) . They belong
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 1 25
quite plainly to the class of poems made effective by
access of emotion, that is, they come of flesh and blood.
Other ancient documents may be noted in Jotham's
'Fable' (Judges ix) ; Samson's 'Riddles' (Judges
xiv. 14; XV. 16) ; David's decision regarding the spoil
(i Sam. XXX. 24); the 'Proverbs' in i Sam. x. 11,
and xxiv. 13. Of still another sort are the cycles
of stories (often exhibiting traces of rearrangement
and interpolation) relating to the patriarchs, to
Abraham, Jacob, Joseph, and so on; or the hero-
tales, about Samson and the youthful David, for
instance. The former limn types, constructed from
tribes or clans; the latter emphasize achievements
of men whose lives fell within the penumbra of the
historical period, but set them in a legendary, almost
epic, perspective. While, again, the fragment in
Genesis vi. 1-4, introducing the Titans (Nephilim),
harks back to a stage of religion so remote that the
narrator has lost all sense of its implications.^ This
example may serve as a warning, to be kept in mind
^ Something of the same kind may be traced in that complex
document, the "Blessing of Jacob" (Genesis xlix), if, as some think,
it is reminiscent of a religion in which the signs of the zodiac
played a prominent part. (Joseph is Sagittarius, Dan is Scorpio,
and so on). Even if. this be tenable, it is perfectly obvious that
the writer knew nothing about it, never had such possibilities in
mind.
126 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
constantly, that the documents under consideration
often tell very little, because their authors do not
themselves appreciate their material. Thus Ishmael,
Moab, Rachel, Leah,^ Hagar, and so forth, are not
persons, but the names of clans or districts. Simi-
larly, Asher, Gad, Milcah, Sarah, and, probably,
Laban, are names, not of men and women, but of
gods and goddesses. Of course this amounts to a
statement that the documents, instead of furnishing
a straightforward history, raise numerous and com-
plex problems. Thus, for instance, it has been sug-
gested that the story of Jacob's encounter with the
angel is a very faint reminiscence of the Nephilim.
Jacob was a Titan once, and could do titanic things.
Now he has become a mere man, but with this sur-
vival from his mythical past which, naturally, his
present biographer fails to comprehend. However
this may be, it is quite evident that the literature
before Josiah offers legend chiefly; and the his-
torical parts, post-dating Israel's settlement in
Canaan, and going back scarcely beyond Saul or
David, have been subjected to a process of idealiza-
* As in the case cited in the previous note, Rachel and Leah
suggest a totemism from which meaning has faded utterly for
the writer. In other words, we are at a late stage in the develop-
ment even of Semitic religion, to say nothing of universal religion.
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 1 27
tion and reconstruction; so, they too contain a large
imaginative factor.
Accordingly, the conclusion of the matter, as
concerns the early literature, may be summed up
as follows. Prior to the Exodus we know nothing;
and the actors mentioned must be viewed as legendary
figures. The sojourn in Egypt, the Exodus, and the
migrations in the wilderness were all subjects of a
persistent tradition in Israel. Very possibly they
may have foundation in fact; if so, what did happen
differed in essentials from much alleged in the nar-
rative. Nevertheless, the story, as we have it, by the
light it throws upon Semitic customs, helps us to
arrive at a sober view of the probable events. Even
Moses must be taken, in great part, as a legendary,
in some part, as a mythical, figure. His career and
acts conform to certain well-understood social and
religious characteristics of Semitic nomad clans,
and, to this extent, can be rediscovered and systema-
tized. ^ Beyond this general setting we possess no
real knowledge of Moses, who was, not a man, but
an idealized epitome thrown back by a later age
upon a supposititious heroic past, its own creation.
^ It is a commonplace that, for centuries after Moses' alleged
date, the Hebrews shared the polytheism of adjacent "Semitic
heathenism." Cf. A Sketch of Semitic Origins, George A. Barton.
128 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
And after the conquest of Canaan had begun, and
ended, so far, the same traits persist. David, a
brigand sheik originally, is clothed upon imagina-
tively till he actually becomes a vicegerent of Yahn-^h.
Or, in his relation of the narrative, the -sympathies
of the author, with the northern or southern kingdom,
as the case may be, transform the circumstances.
Briefly, as in ancient literature universally, so here,
nobody knows anything of origins, and, when history
begins, the writers evince elementary conscience
for accuracy. Subjective views as to what the facts
ought to have been render an objective report im-
possible. In the circumstances, nothing else could
be anticipated; and Israel is no exception to the
normal human rule, nay, affords another, and very
impressive, proof.
Nothing in the Old Testament has fallen so hope-
lessly upon the evil fate of false representation as
the prophetic literature. The prophets, from Elijah,
and even Samuel, to the author of Daniel, were
riven from their historical position, deported to a
Hellenistic provenance, and tricked out in every de-
vice of unlicenced phantasy. As a matter of fact,
the Hebrew prophet was a man who could discern
the signs of the times, rate temporal events at their
value sub specie ceternitatis, and speak to his genera-
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE 1 29
tion accordingly. There is no doubt that he believed
himself accredited to deliver a special message; but
he spoke as he knew and, very specially, as he felt,
in a certain contingency. Thus his work always
faced two ways. On the one hand, he had a clear
eye for the contemporary circumstances of his people ;
on the other, an intuition for the significance of re-
ligion, as affected by these circumstances, and as
capable of reaction upon them. Consequently, the
prophetic books are of inestimable price for compre-
hension at once of the civil history and the religious
evolution of the Hebrews in these days. By this
relation they must be judged and interpreted.
After Solomon's death, the Hebrew empire under-
went immediate dissolution; the division into two
kingdoms, Israel in the north, and Judah in the
south, dates from 937 B.C. This event wrought
momentous results in two ways. It undermined
the political strength of the Hebrews once for all,
and, by the isolation of the northern kingdom from
the incipient religious primacy of Jerusalem, origi-
nated conditions favourable to the continuance of
heathenism within Israel itself. Not long after
their foundation, both kingdoms were plundered
by the powerful Pharaoh Shishak, Judah suffering
more severely. This, with the growth of commerce
130 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in Israel, led to the dominance of the northern king-
dom, and Judah made alliance with Damascus.
Meanwhile a new political situation was eventuating
in the Euphrates-Tigris region, where the power
of Assyria was maturing surely. Ashumatsirpal III
had felt strong enough to attack the Aramaeans on
the head waters of the Euphrates, and, in 876, took
Carchemish, the capital of the attenuated Hittite
kingdom. This was contemporaneous with the
rise of the house of Omri to ascendancy in Israel,
when Samaria became the capital; and Ahab, the
monarch of this dynasty notorious unjustly to us,
reigned from 874 B.C. Under this house Judah
was reduced to vassalage. In the interval, the As-
syrians, under Shalmaneser II, had been engaged
with Damascus, which headed a coalition against
them. Ahab contributed no less than 2000 chariots
and 10,000 men. After the indecisive battle of Qar-
qar, in 852, he loosed himself from this league, and,
about the same period, the advance guard of another
great migration from Arabia (the Nabataean) instilled
fresh ambition into Edom and Moab. This is the
era in which the prophet Elijah rebukes the idolatry
of Israel, and Elisha proves himself a dangerous
agitator. Thrice Shalmaneser attempted to break
Damascus, and failed; while Judah, weakened by
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I3I
the drain of men and treasure required from a vassal
state, fell a prey to a Philistine-Cushite alliance, thus
affording Mesha, king of Moab, opportunity to regain
independence. Instigated by Elisha, Jehu murdered
the whole house of Omri, except young Joash, and,
by 842, was tributary to Assyria. But, occupied
with the Armenians nearer home, Assyria retired for
a time, and, in 810, Joash is a vassal of Damascus.
Again the Assyrian advanced, Damascus yielded
tribute, and "the Lord gave Israel a saviour, so that
they went out from under the hands of the Syrians "
(2 Kings xiii. 5). These centuries of unbroken
confusion, of thrust and counterthrust, could not
have been favourable to high internal development.
It is not surprising, then, that written prophecy
does not arise till later, till a time, that is, when the
Hebrews could rest long enough to consider their
position. From 799 B.C. events bear less harshly
upon the twin kingdoms. Jehoash is strong enough
to worst Benhadad II, and Amaziah to take the
Edomite capital. By 784 Jeroboam II and Uzziah,
both energetic and successful rulers, have come to the
thrones of Israel and Judah respectively. The two
countries now attain a prosperity unexampled since
the spacious days of David and Solomon. Damascus
has been broken, and Assyria is too engrossed else-
132 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
where to interfere. Just at this juncture the full
tide of Hebrew prophecy begins to flow.
Amos makes his startling and disconcerting ap-
pearance, to warn the people that luxurious, easy-
going, almost materialistic worship cannot please Yah-
w6h., and must tumble to disaster. The God is a just
God, who hates evil, loves good, and wills to establish
judgement within the gate. Forget this, his funda-
mental character, and you prove yourself a dupe
to the mere external show of stability. The real
fact is that Yahweh reigns wherever justice runs,
and admits no special obligation, even to Israel,
if injustice flourish within the border. Thus, the
monotheistic view attains definite expression only at
this late day. The idea received further develop-
ment in the message of Hosea, for whom God is love,
and from whose pathetic conviction the iuture faith
of Israel sprouts. Jeroboam II died in 744: in the
short space of eight months, Zechariah and Shallum
were murdered and Menahem set on the throne —
a barbarous despot. Israel was rent by faction,
and Menahem became tributary to Assyria. Mean-
while Judah prospered under Jotham. Faction
wrought further anarchy in Israel; Menahem' s
son, Pekahiah, was murdered, and Pekah, an as-
syrophobe, ruled. He leagued himself with Damascus
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I33
against Tiglathpileser III, and tried to force Judah
into the alliance. Refusing, Judah was invaded, and,
brought to dire straits by the rebellion of Edom
and an invasion of the Philistines, appealed to As-
syria. Tiglathpileser advanced to the rescue, and
plundered Israel. Pekah was murdered by his own
people, and Hoshea, who succeeded, accepted As-
syrian suzerainty. In 732 Tiglathpileser took Da-
mascus, deported its inhabitants, and Palestine enjoyed
peace for six years. On the accession of Shalmaneser
IV, in 727, Israel joined a Syrian league in revolt,
and, in 722, the northern kingdom came to an end,
on the fall of Samaria, and the deportation of the
directing classes. Israel was now an Assyrian pro-
vince, Judah a vassal state. These were the days
of the mighty Sargon and of the mightier Isaiah.
Isaiah's whole outlook was conditioned by the
contemporary political situation. Israel had become
a memory now, and Judah might be snuffed out
unceremoniously at any moment. To comprehend
this astounding shock to Hebrew expectation and
reminiscence, a new philosophy of history was needed ;
to weather temporal danger with a whole skin de-
manded a practical poHcy. Isaiah furnished both.
Stated in a word, the former pivots on the idea that
judgement is not the goal, but the prerequisite of
134 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
salvation. This, as Isaiah thought, the people must
be forced to grasp, so that a remnant, if no more,
might be preserved to witness for essential spiritual
truth. On the practical side, Assyria is to him but
a tool in the hands of the Almighty ; therefore, v^ith
Assyria Judah must keep strict faith. Mount Zion,
w^here Yahweh dwelleth, cannot be violated, must
stay inviolable. Heedless of the prophet, Hezekiah
listened to Egypt. In 701 Sennacherib descended
v^ith a veteran army, overwhelmed the Egyptians,
and decimated Judah, deporting more than 200,000
souls. Nevertheless, Jerusalem stood, and Isaiah
was justified to such an extent that Hezekiah purified
the worship of the temple from much idolatrous
admixture. Their contemporary, Micah, an old-
time idealist of the Amos type, poured the awful
vials of his wrath upon this same idolatry, especially
upon the social conditions wherein it rooted. Then
prophecy fell upon silence. The Assyrian guarantee
was to suffice for a little, and the Assyrian gods !
In the brilliant era of Esarhaddon and Assurbani-
pal, when Assyria lorded it from the mountains of
Van to the Nile, Judah could hardly fail to be a mere
enclave in the magnificent empire. And, from 686
B.C., when Manasseh came to the throne, it proved so.
The gods of Assyria became the gods of the Hebrew
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I35
remnant, and prophecy, being a plain nuisance, was
stamped out fiercely. The sixth and seventh chapters
of Micah refer to this leaden period. All external
supports and encumbrances having vanished, the
writer appeals to the still, small voice, lending proph-
ecy the purest expression yet attained. "He hath
showed thee, O man, what is good; and what doth
the Lord require of thee, but to do justly, and to
love mercy, and to walk humbly with thy God?"
(vi. 8). No Hebrew speaks here to a backsliding
folk, but a man utters an imperishable thing to hu-
manity. That world has passed long, long ago,
with the pride and the lust thereof, leaving scarce
a wrack behind, but these words ring down the ages,
as absolutely true to-day as in the sad hours of their
first utterance. Never was a man's sense for ultimate
values to be vindicated more thoroughly. Assyria's
doom dogged her already. Another widespread
displacement was in process, this time in Central
Asia — the Scythian horsemen had saddled. The
Dies Irae of Zephaniah (i. 14 f.) neared dawn, judge-
ment had been entered against Manasseh's line and
sin. Nahum and Habakkuk divine the catastrophe
of proud, cruel Assyria. "The burden of Nineveh"
(Nah. i. i) ; "shall he not spare to slay the nations
continually?" (Hab. i. 17.) Jeremiah, the inter-
136 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
cesser with Yahweh for his own erring people, also
appears in the land. And by 620 B.C. the Scythians
have swept past Nineveh, and swarmed into the
littoral of Palestine.
Manasseh had died in 647, and after Amon's mur-
der, at the end of a two years' reign, the child Josiah
had been placed on the throne. In his minority,
under the assyrophile court clique, idolatry went
from bad to worse. At length the pietistic party
ventured to send a book of the law, discovered in
the temple, to the king, now a youth of twenty-four,
whom it moved profoundly.^ This document, our
Deuteronomy, marked a fresh epoch in Hebrew
religion. A new worship, centralized at Jerusalem,
and a new god almost, who bore no natural relation
to this present evil world, were introduced. Religion
was evaporated from its intimate union with the
body of the civil state, and set apart as a holy essence.
A point of view had come to clear consciousness,
whence the entire past of Israel could be considered
and reinterpreted : lights could be heightened, shad-
ows deepened, according to a firmly set belief in a
peculiar, divine purpose. The prophet had blazed
^ His reference of the matter to the spae-wife Huldah is typical
of the conceptions of science at that time (cf. 2 Kings xxii.
12, 2 Chronicles xxxiv. 20 f.).
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I37
the way for the priest. Issues most momentous
for the preservation of the religion of Israel, no
matter what temporal mischances might befall,
were settled at nigh a stroke. With this reversal,
an outgrowth of Assyrian success, and of a reaction
against heathen customs when the political power
of the conqueror declined, the literature to Josiah
ends.
Josiah's new-bom devotion to Yahweh, coincident
with the removal of the Assyrian yoke, profited him
little. The Pharaoh Necho invaded the land; the
righteous king met defeat and death in another fight
at Megiddo, that cockpit of Palestine. The last
scene in this act of the drama ended in even worse
disaster; for the Chaldaean, Nebuchadnezzar, now
monarch of the new Babylonian empire which suc-
ceeded Assyria, took Jerusalem by storm, in 586 B.C.,
and on three several occasions the flower of the popu-
lation was deported to the Euphrates-Tigris valley,
there to learn much from Babylonian and Persian
civilization.
It seems superfluous to enforce the conclusion
that, as a result of the historico-critical method, the
traditional conceptions of the "mission of Israel,"
of the nature of the Old Testament, and of the rela-
tion of Jewish religion to Christianity,
138 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
" Are melted into air, into thin air , . .
. . . like the baseless fabric of " a " vision."
Doubtless, it is still possible to flout the critic, and say,
"he's of a most facinerious spirit." But, whatever
his reputed atrocities, names neither hurt, nor alter
the facts. One of the most spiritually minded of
living scholars, a man persuaded slowly, by stress
of evidence, to pass from supposition to knowledge,
has placed himself on record as follows : —
"And now I must make an admission to you, which
it is hard for me to make, but which is my fullest
scientific conviction, based upon the most cogent
grounds, that in the sense in which the historian
speaks of "knowing," we know absolutely nothing
about Moses. All original records are missing;
we have not received a line, not even a word, from
Moses himself, or from any of his contemporaries:
even the celebrated Ten Commandments are not
from him, but, as can be proved, were written in
the first half of the seventh century, between 700
and 650 B.C. The oldest accounts we have of Moses
are five hundred years later than his time." *
This, and much like it, being admitted unavoidably,
the keystone has fallen from the arch of the impressive
and imperious theological construction: we have
not "Moses to father." In these circumstances,
^ C. H. Cornill, in The Prophets of Israel, p. 17 (Eng. trans.).
BREACHES OF THE HOUSE I39
but a single moral need be pointed. The ignorant
and the dogmatic, be they laity or clergy, cannot
learn too soon that, as matters stand, scholarship
alone is able to reply to scholarship. A complete
transformation has overtaken us, and the sole course
is to face the judgement without reservation. This
at least spells sincerity — always a firm ally of safety
when the final reckoning arrives.
In the nature of the case, I have been able to
furnish only the merest impressionistic sketch of the
historico-critical attitude to the Old Testament.
Nevertheless, it suffices to convey a very definite set
of inferences.
Note. — The following works are readily available for readers
of English who wish to pursue the subject farther. A History
of Egypt, J. H. Breasted; History of Babylonia and Assyria, H.
Winckler and J. A. Craig ; The Early History of Syria and Pales-
tine, L. B. Paton; An Introduction to the Literature of the Old
Testament, S. R. Driver (Scribner, New York) ; The Genesis
of Genesis, B. W. Bacon; Triple Tradition of the Exodus, B. W.
Bacon (Macmillan Co., New York) ; The Documents of the
Hexateuch (two vols.), W. E. Addis (David Nutt, London) ;
The Legends of Genesis, H. Gunkel (Open Court Co., Chicago) ;
the Old Testament Articles in the Encyclopcedia Biblica (Macmil-
lan Co.), or in Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible (Scribner).
LECTURE IV
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST
Divergent opinions on minor points, and on several
important internal problems, such, for example, as
the origin and organization of the Psalter, admitted,
it may be affirmed, fairly enough, that scholars agree
on their solution of the Old Testament riddle. The
historico-critical movement has triumphed all along
the line here. Still, even so, many, especially in
English-speaking lands, fondle the idea that New
Testament study walks the old paths, and that thus,
criticism notwithstanding, the citadel of dogmatic
Christianity maintains itself inviolable. But when
one comes to inquire what the leaders of the his-
torico-critical movement have to record about the
Christian sacred books, one discovers very soon that
this confidence lacks solid foundation. So much so
that "the inhabitant of Maroth" may well wait
'' anxiously for good : because evil is come down . . .
unto the gate of Jerusalem." Moreover, his per-
plexity must increase when he reflects upon a fact
that events often conspire to hide from him. Doubt-
less he has heard, in a general way, of the *' attack on
140
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST I41
the New Testament," and his teachers, true to a
sadly mistaken sense of duty, have informed him
that all this amounts to 'scepticism.' It were perti-
nent, therefore, to set in the forefront that critical
discussion of the New Testament is no more identical
with 'scepticism' to-day than the conclusions of the
scientific consciousness are indistinguishable from
' materialism.' For the main volume of this inquiry
proceeds from Christian scholars, from members of
the Christian ministry as a rule. These investigators
seek a more adequate knowledge of the growth and
development of faith in Christ. Above all, they de-
sire to strip our religion of accretions from non-
Christian sources, and to trace the transformations
wrought by this admixture. In addition, we must
call to mind that the natural concentration of New
Testament study in the hands of professing, and
often official. Christians, has resulted in a situa-
tion far different from 'scepticism,' or anything
that, in common justice, can be termed 'scepti-
cism.' Indeed, the chief preliminary consideration
issues from this very circumstance.
3. The New Testament
The Old Testament contains the socio-religious
record of an alien race, of a people whose faith is not
142 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
ours, who continue strangers to several transitive
principles that permeate the Christian consciousness
through and through. Accordingly, it may be
treated with a certain independence and objectivity
possible with respect to the New Testament only at
the end of long, tentative trial, involving bitter
conflict. Moreover, in the one case far more easily
than in the other, the scholar rids himself of the
iteration of the still, small voice that whispers. What
is left ? With incomparably less inhibition, he finds
himself able to ask. What have we here? As a
consequence, the historico-critical account of the
Old Testament possesses a clear outline, and com-
mands a general assent by no means reached as yet
for the New. Particularly is this true about those
matters of apparent detail which in sum, despite
their subordinate character, afl^ect the larger outlook
deeply. An Episcopalian, just because he is an
Episcopalian; a Presbyterian, just because he is a
Presbyterian; a Baptist, just because he is a Baptist;
a Roman Catholic, just because he is a Roman Cath-
olic, approaches the New Testament with special pre-
possessions on special points. Similar considerations
touch Old Testament inquiry much less; on the
contrary, they conspire to prejudge interpretation of
the New. Besides, all confessional Christians, so
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 43
far as their "written constitutions" go, agree to view
the New Testament from a doctrinal rather than
a historical standpoint. Needless to say, this fact
has wielded, and still wields, incalculable influence.
Thus, for many causes that we cannot expect to es-
cape yet awhile, the Christian books must remain
subjects of controversy; differences bom of senti-
ment must occupy the foreground, very likely out of
proportion to their primary importance ; views upon
matters of fact must continue to be tinctured with
conjectural elements.
No better illustration of these obvious conditions
could be wished than the reception accorded, eleven
years ago, to Harnack's famous preface,^ where he
affirmed that criticism was moving back gradually
to ''traditional standpoints." Excitement electrified
many; one heard on every side that Strauss and
Tubingen had been put to ruinous flight, that the
position had been saved for the entire array of eccle-
siastical dogma. On the other hand, one did not
hear that, on close examination in detail, the con-
clusions of the Berlin master agreed with those of
criticism on nigh all points of fundamental im-
portance. For him, as for the "evicted" critics, the
^ Prefixed to vol. i, part ii, of his Chronologie der altchrisU
lichen Liter atur.
144 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
author of the First Gospel was unknown ; the author-
ship of the Third was ''purely a problem of internal
criticism," and therefore a matter of opinion more or
less; the Apostle John was not the author of the
Fourth Gospel, and so on. Commenting on this,
one of the sanest among New Testament critics
says: "To me, however, this new cult for the 'tradi-
tion ' — by which, as a matter of fact, Hamack
understands something quite different from the 'tra-
dition ' of Zahn ^ and his followers — seems quite as
questionable as the earlier prejudice against it." ^
And Harnack himself supports this contention in the
preface to a recent study. "I saw myself brought
forward as a witness to testify that in historical criti-
cism we are returning to the conservative point of
view. I am not responsible for this misapprehen-
sion of my position. . . . Let me, therefore, express
now my absolute conviction that historical criticism
teaches us ever more clearly that many traditional
positions are untenable and must give place to new
and startling discoveries." ^ We may conclude, ac-
cordingly, that although, thanks to peculiar and
irremovable circumstances besetting the inquiry,
^ The most prominent conservative critic.
^ An Introduction to the New Testament, A. Jiilicher, p. 27.
^ Preface to Lukas der Arzt (written in May, 1906).
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 45
some New Testament questions, particularly as
they pertain to specialized problems, stand in con-
troversy, a partial consensus begins to emerge.
Without condescending upon extreme positions, let
us try to understand what this conveys.
In the first place, and generally, the New Testa-
ment cannot be treated as a hook. It contains a
literature composed at intervals during a period of
130 years approximately. Twenty-seven contribu-
tions, of the most varied character, occur in it. We
know that they were written by ten or twelve persons
at the lowest calculation; but how many others had
a hand in the library as it exists now we have no
present means of determining. It is apposite to
recall in this connexion, for example, that the canon
of four Gospels was probably substituted for one
Gospel under suspicious circumstances, and that one
document, in any case, was subjected to mutilation
for reasons that had nothing to do with its historical
value. As they stand in our English Bible, the New
Testament writings disregard chronological sequence,
and this in itself has produced numerous misconcep-
tions. Of course, interpolations, additions, and cor-
rections are nowhere indicated, so that he who runs
may read. It is clear, however, that, taking 46 a.d.
as an upper, and 175 a.d. as a lower, limit, the con-
L
146 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
stituent portions were produced much in the same
way as other human documents. They reflect one
religious movement among many, but a movement
pecuHar on account of its intensity, its missionary
spirit, and its powerful syncretist tendency; never-
theless, a movement that originated and spread under
historical conditions characteristic of the Roman
Empire at the time, especially as they related (i) to
the region of Asia Minor, including Palestine, (2) to
the Jewish Diaspora, (3) to the promiscuous religious
consciousness, marked by elements drawn from
Hellenistic thought, Jewish theocracy, and Oriental
apocalyptic vision, all interacting. The entire
temper of the period, especially in its Semitic and
Oriental qualities, is so foreign to the ethos of West-
ern peoples that, more than likely, many phenomena
must elude our grasp always. Nevertheless, such
light as is possible can break through in one way only.
We must study the Roman imperial polity, religion,
and local government, Hellenistic ideas, the Oriental
gnostic spirit, the unique position of the Jewish
race, and the whole social situation, primarily as
moulded by slavery and by the intermixture of
ancient cultures, if we would realize, even faintly,
the remarkable flurry of events whence the books
arose. Written by men in a world of men, they are
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 47
tractable to explanation as a supremely human
attempt to alter or disprove, to destroy or understand,
some supernal things of life as it seemed then. What
we know of the epoch, what we can ascertain by
historical and linguistic analysis, or by chronological
research, serves here, as elsewhere, to reduce the
conglomerate facts to dynamic order.
Critically viewed, then, the New Testament origi-
nated in what may be pictured as three great waves of
production. In each successive sweep it is possible
to discern elements that preserve continuous identity,
and thus to elicit the primitive tradition that nucleated
after the appalling disaster of the Crucifixion. At
the same time, civilization seethed so in the chief age
of composition that alterations of standpoint, and
even some of their causes, can be detected. Con-
trasts in the circumstances and characters, in the
ability, training, and associations of the individual
authors count for much. And, very plainly, the
migration of the new teaching, first, from its home
in Galilee to Jerusalem, and then from its Judaistic
limits into the monstrous whirlpool of Roman-
Hellenistic culture, wrought profoundly. We must
envisage the possibilities, latent amid these emigra-
tions, in some such way as we think of the very subtle
variations that overtook the English ethos, first, in
148 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
old New England, then in the broad United States.
The resultant differences, that is, pivot upon a con-
trasted manner of approach to problems which
themselves undergo no total change. But, elusive
as they are, in the modern instance, we know well
enough how to set about an explanation. To this
procedure the ancient world is amenable, mutatis
mutandis, and to no other.
Accordingly, pursuant to this method, the first
period of Christian authorship dates from the earli-
est Letters of Paul (Galatians, 46 a.d.)^ to the de-
struction of Jerusalem by Titus in 70 a.d. Within
these twenty to twenty-five years some documents of
vast moment for the Christian consciousness came to
birth. Plainly, the Pauline writings form by far the
most important group. In the present state of
knowledge, I understand it to be as sure as assurance
can go regarding such matters, that the four major
Epistles (Romans, Galatians, i and 2 Corinthians)
belong to this era, and that the other Letters,
except the Pastorals, Ephesians, part of Colos-
sians, and 2 Thessalonians are to be attributed to
Paul. To this view some scholars would demur.^
^ Of course, 46 is extravagantly early for Galatians; 50-54
would cover the usual datings.
^ It does not seem to me that the views of van Manen, Steck, and
Professor Smith, of Tulane University, can be entertained seriously.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 49
So far as I am able to judge, many questions con-
cerning the Pauline documents must be regarded
as sub judice. To this time also one may assign
the collection of Sayings of Jesus, used by the
Synoptists, especially by the author of our Gospel
of Matthew. If the writer of the Acts of the
Apostles enjoyed documentary sources, — a prob-
lem still disputed hotly, — then his oldest source, the
so-called ''We" document (xvi. 10-17; xx. 4-15;
xxi. 1-18; xxvii. i-xxviii. 16), must be referred to
this period. Finally, the Jewish apocalypses, rooted
in ancient and obscure eschatological saga of the
Semites/ used by the author of the Revelation,
such, for example, as the astounding allegory repro-
duced in chapter xii (cf. xi-xiii; xvii-xviii), were
composed, in all likelihood, before the final cata-
clysm at the holy city.
The second period dates from the fall of Jerusalem
to (roughly) the death of Nerva, in 98 a.d. Like the
first, it produced documents of the utmost moment.
To this time belong the Synoptic Gospels. Mark
came almost immediately after the victory of
Titus; Luke is dependent upon Mark; while
^ So great is the difficulty of this subject that eminent scholars,
like Dietrich, Gunkel, Spitta, Eduard Meyer, and W. Bousset,
have been able to effect little more than a beginning of interpre-
tation: dogmatic exegesis is out of the question.
150 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Matthew, which has been edited more than once,
provides an account palatable to all Christians, and
the additions that enrich it represent a late stratum}
But, in any case, redaction, interpolation, and
excision aside, the general outline of the books, as
we have them, was settled during this generation, and
especially the ideas that dominated their composition
had crystallized. The literature of this epoch in-
cludes also the work of one of the three great theolo-
gians of the New Testament — the Epistle to the
Hebrews. The authorship remains an insoluble
problem; I am unable to see how it is possible to
overcome objections to the current opinion which
connects the Letter with the name of Barnabas.
^ E.g. i-ii; iv. 14-16; xiv; xvi-xvii; xxi. 2-5; xxvii. 3-10;
xxvii. 62-xxviii. 20. Although I am without shadow of title to
express an 'expert' opinion upon the Synoptic problem, I think
that an unprejudiced man, who has read the literature carefully,
may come to the following conclusions, which I record with all
diffidence. It seems to me, on these Gospels, as we have them,
that (i) Mark is the objective source of Matthew and Luke ; (2)
Matthew and Luke presuppose other documentary sources, pos-
sibly unknown to Mark, but how these ought to be rated or
described precisely 1 find myself quite unable to say; (3) never-
theless, there is a long and tangled history prior to Mark, in
which Palestinian and Pauline influences interact; (4) Luke did
not use Matthew as a source, nor Matthew Luke; (5) Matthew
and Luke were affected by streams of tradition in the Christian
community that differed in some particulars ; (6) all the Synoptics
have been worked over — Mark like the o.hers.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 15I
Another remarkable document of this time is the
Revelation of St. John the Divine. It offers a
recension of Jewish apocalyptic sources, brilliantly
elaborated; the authorship cannot be determined
with any certainty. All we can say is that probably
John the Apostle did not compose it.^ The Acts
of the Apostles, which still presents in many re-
spects one of the enigmas of the New Testament,
must also be assigned to these years. Perhaps it
belongs to the reign of Domitian (81-96), while, on
the other hand, it may date after the death of Nerva,
and be referable, accordingly, to the first decade
of Trajan. In any case, these last years furnish
I Peter.
The final period, from the accession of Trajan till,
say, Marcus Aurelius's assumption of sole power
(161 A.D.), provides one document of the first magni-
tude — the Fourth Gospel. In my humble judge-
ment, this must be accounted, for several reasons,
the pearl of great price of the Nev/ Testament. As
in the case of its lesser companion, Hebrews, the
question of authorship has baffied investigation.
Scholars are agreed, however, that it cannot be
assigned to John the Apostle. And one may as well
^ This is widely disputed still; I give my own impression of
the evidence.
152 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
mention, in passing, that this is an immense gain.
For, if the two companions of Jesus, Mark (through
Peter) and John, had furnished such utterly irre-
concilable accounts of the Master, — contrast the
Sermon on the Mount with the Johannine dis-
courses,— it would be impossible for us to determine
what manner of man he ^ was in his habit upon
earth. Before the year 120 a.d. come the Epistles
of John, followed by Jude, and the Pastoral
Epistles (i and 2 Timothy, and Titus). The latest
books in the New Testament canon are the
Letter of James, and 2 Peter, which may bring
us down as far as 150, or even 175, a.d. I may add
that, on the w^hole, this summary tends in the con-
servative direction, as critical opinion now goes.
The most careless reader of even the English
version cannot fail to observe that extraordinary
contrasts pervade this literature. The Revelation
and Mark move literally in dissimilar universes.
The Acts and Hebrews are determined by motives
of the most diverse nature. And, for readers of
Greek, what a difference rules the verbal habit
of the two great anonymous books, Hebrews
^ Perhaps I should indicate at this point that I distinguish
between Jesus, who was a historical figure, and Christ, Who is
metahistorical.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 53
and the Revelation. Nay, more, these contrasts,
appearing on the surface, as they do, are nothing to
the profounder appositions traceable to general per-
spective, literary facility, spiritual discernment, and
regnant personal tendency. And, in every case, these
last constitute main factors in the reasons why the
books came to be written at all. Notwithstanding,
it seems practicable to group the stars of the first
magnitude by reference to the contemporary condi-
tion of the Christian atmosphere.
When we approach a literature from the side of
strict history, the question of convergent, formative
influences always commands paramount attention.
To understand a book, we must know something of
the forces that played around and upon its author.
Nor is the reason far to seek. A writer never sits
down to record everything — the task transcends
possibility. Of necessity, his views and conclusions
are formulated in synoptic fashion. He picks and
chooses, not indeed to induce a specious effect, but
because he cannot proceed in any other way. The
crowded, insignificant details of human life must not
be permitted to swamp the narrative ; the mere surge
of them would drown affairs of real moment. So,
without exception, a meritorious writer takes for
granted that his public shares a com^mon perspective.
154 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
He lets the reader perform his part, anticipates this
ability in him. Of course, many fail to realize this,
because unaccustomed to reflect upon such matters.
But an elementary acquaintance with classical
literature, for example, suffices to bring it home
forcibly. We cannot appreciate the comedies of
Aristophanes just as the Athenian audience did; we
find it difficult to make allowance, in Herodotus, for
the pervasive conception of a working Nemesis;
we miss not a little of the verisimilitude of the
speeches in Thucydides; many details concerning
Caesar's army continue to elude us; it demands
careful study to realize the socio-political atmosphere
breathed by Tacitus. Nay, the same holds true of
literature that stands comparatively near. A novel
like Vernon Lee's "Miss Brown," a play like "The
Colonel," presented so cleverly by Edgar Bruce,
presuppose the so-called aesthetic craze in England
thirty years ago ; and we must refresh our memories
by reference to Gilbert and Sullivan's "Patience,"
if we would enter into the situation. Be they great
or small, literary products, having the slightest pre-
tension to significance, require us to remember this.
The New Testament writings form no exception
to the rule. When, for instance, Mark says, "And
they compel one passing by, Simon of Cyrene, com-
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 55
ing from the country, the father of Alexander and
Rufus, to go " (xv. 21), it is evident he assumes
that his readers will recognize these personal refer-
ences — this local and contemporary knowledge fails
us entirely. Recalling, then, that all authors content
themselves with hints and suggestions respecting
affairs familiar in their time, we find that the New
Testament, taken as a whole, presupposes two audi-
ences, and therefore two circles of origin. Followers
of Jesus constituted both, but their several tempo-
ral circumstances happened to be different. The
smaller, more highly organized, and less cosmopolitan
group had its centre in Palestine, and clung to Jerusa-
lem as the foreordained city of God. It was domi-
nated, accordingly, by ideas current among the Jews
in these days, and by a conviction that, in the new
religious community, the long travail of Israel had
attained finality at last — the true Messiah had
appeared, lived, paid the penalty, and ascended, as
the Scriptures prophesied. Therefore these Scrip-
tures, above all, the Mosaic Law, were held of pe-
culiar moment in the plan of salvation. Apocalyptic
expectations abounded, and the Messiah might re-
turn at any hour, to execute his judgement, to claim
his kingdom, to inaugurate his world-rule. Here
we find an imperium in imperio, as it were ; a special
156 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
phenomenon, aside from Roman-Hellenistic civiliza-
tion, concerned to preserve its own traits so far as
possible, even under the heel of heathen might.
But, emphasize the Jewish purview as one may,
the fact remains that Roman-Hellenistic culture was
the universal feature of the age — the very disciples
of the innermost circle answered to Greek names.
Antioch and Ephesus, Rome and Alexandria, typified
influences that could not be excluded or stayed. So,
as Jesus himself journeyed into Phoenicia, his dis-
ciples fared forth amid the perplexing civilization of
the wonderful empire, and to momentous conse-
quence. With all the will in the world, the Gentile
could not treat the Scriptures or the Law as if he
were a Jew "to the manner born." His apprehen-
sion of the anticipated apocalypse could not but take
a course peculiar to itself. His appreciation of the
significance to be attached to Messiah's career and
continued spiritual presence was coloured, inevitably,
by associations drawn from Graeco-Roman or Oriental
traditions in culture. More than aught else, per-
haps, the means and methods of his education, reach-
ing back to the age of the Sophists, and transmitted
through a series of glorious intellectual achieve-
ments, destined him to react upon the plastic faith
in very distinctive style. Similarly, a Jew resident
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 57
in Palestine, by the mere fact of his Aramseic dialect,
would diverge widely from a Greek-speaking Gentile.
His direct heritage from the spiritual past of his folk,
his conventional interpretation of the Scriptures, his
inherent unity with ancient social custom and moral
observance, his racial pride and expectation, sur-
rounded him on all sides, and marked out the old
paths wherein he ought to stand fast. Thus, he too
caught up the new faith in a way manifestly his own.
Now, the New Testament writers presuppose these
contrasted, yet in a sense complementary, ethnic
perspectives. The authors assume the aptness
which would be evinced naturally by readers moulded
in one or the other environment. By no means " all
things to all men," they assuredly "write up to"
some things in some men.
Thus, our New Testament documents range
themselves in two main divisions. First, those
which sprang from the culture-circle of Palestine, and
are characterized by a predominance of the objective
or narrative element, though by no means to the
exclusion of other tendencies. Second, those which
originated in face of Gentile circumstances and
needs, and are characterized by a predominance of
an idealizing (sometimes theologico-philosophical)
movement, though by no means to the exclusion of
158 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
historical references. Necessarily, a common tradi-
tion, sadly overlaid and obscured in the canon,
underlies both. The first group finds its great
exemplars in the First and Second Gospels, and in
Revelation. Of lesser moment are the Epistles
of James and Jude. The chief witnesses of the
second group are the Epistles of Paul, Hebrews,
and the Fourth Gospel, with the Petrine epistles as
subsidiary. The Third Gospel occupies a peculiar
position. On its objective side it seems to belong
with the Synoptics ; on the other hand, some tincture
from Pauline notions has flavoured it. But, as con-
cerns Pauline admixture, the presence of similar
influences in Mark serves to complicate the issue.
I find it impossible to speak decisively of the Acts
of the Apostles. In my personal opinion — which,
pray remember, carries no weight whatever — it may
be regarded as standing between the two groups.
That is to say, it furnishes a partial record of the
manner in which the transition from the narrower to
the wider environment was accomplished. Never-
theless, the standpoint of its author indicates sym-
pathy more with the imperial than with the Pales-
tinian outlook.
Thus, whatever document we traverse, we find
the New Testament writings were motivated like
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 59
other books, that they display throughout those evi-
dences of the universal conditions incident to literary
composition which must be at disposal ere we can
understand or interpret written works. It must be
perfectly obvious that an author who spoke Greek,
and trafficked with Greek-speaking neighbours, who
dwelt where the temple-cult of Jerusalem exercised
no direct authority, and so forth, could not frame his
views without betraying his situation. Only after
frank reception of this and related facts, is it at all
possible, at our late day, to pierce the New Testa-
ment literature so as to arrive at the tradition em-
bedded there. The Gospels, the Epistles, and the
rest —
" are pilgrim-shrines,
Shrines to no code or creed confined, —
The Delphian vales, the Palestines,
The Meccas of the mind."
And, in the course of the journey, a great deal, taken
for history once, falls away. Indeed, the first con-
sequences of critical enquiry cannot but be negative.
Let us look at this aspect of the matter for a moment.
Take, for example, the central figure, and, having
submitted the New Testament evidence to critical
examination, ask, What do we know about Jesus
historically ? If we set aside plausible tales that fit
l6o MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
easily to preconceived and explicable notions, the
result is nothing short of revolutionary to the average
man. The Gospels contain 2899 verses; of these
only about one hundred furnish strict biographical
details. Aside from, the record of the last days at
Jerusalem, and of the teaching, our information about
Jesus and his doings is scanty in the extreme. The
objective facts startle by their omissions. Not only
are the outlines of the faintest, but definite pronounce-
ments are few and far between. Moreover, all the
accounts are at second hand, and present amazing
lacuncB. Thus, the extent of our ignorance becomes
the impressive conclusion of criticism. For the sake
of this impression, let us review what we do not
know. We do not know what Jesus' descent was.
We do not know the year of his birth. We do not
know his birthplace for certain. Our information
about his family is of the most incidental nature.
His early life, his manner of education, the whole
formative period of his youth, remain unrecorded.
Indeed, save for the single incident in the temple, they
are matters of "reverie." ^ We know nothing inti-
mately about the influences which led to the develop-
ment of his religious genius, for his exact relation to
^ Cf. The Education of Christ: Hillside Reveries, W. M.
Ramsay.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST l6l
John the Baptist cannot be recovered. We are
unaware how long his ministry lasted. We do not
know his age at the time he undertook his mission.
*'If we start from quite critical premises, we must
come to the conclusion that we have no absolute
certainty that any single saying in the Gospels was
uttered in that precise form by Jesus himself." ^
Our available information is such that we do not
know what the Last Supper meant to Jesus. " Only
one thing is probably certain, that at the original
Supper Jesus did not mean to institute a sacrament
in the Catholic, Lutheran, or Calvinistic sense." ^
In the same way, we are unaware what Jesus thought
about his own death. "One thing only is certain,
that Jesus never conceived or expressed the thought
that God's forgiveness of sins depended absolutely
upon his ovvn sacrificial death or upon the vicarious
atonement rendered by his death." ^ In like manner,
too, we do not know what view Jesus took about the
resurrection of the dead. ''We have really no
authentic information as to what took place at the
trial of Jesus. Matthew and Luke assumed that he
must have been asked whether he was the Messiah,
and that he must have preserved his Messianic
^ Rud. Steck, in d. Protestantische Monatshefte, March, 1903.
^ Jesus, W. Bousset, p. 206. ^ Ibid., pp. 207-208.
l62 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
incognito to the end, refusing to answer the high
priest's question. Mark, on the contrary, assumed
that he admitted his Messiahship when the Messiah
was defined as ''the Son of the Blessed." It is
evident that when these accounts were written, the
terms "Son of Man," "Christ," "Son of God," and
" Son of the Blessed" were all synonymous, or tending
to become so, and that "Son of God" was equivalent
to "God," so that the blasphemy of making oneself
equal to God could be regarded as the charge brought
against Jesus. Nothing could more clearly indicate
the late and unreliable nature of this narrative." ^
We do not know where Gethsemane was. We do
not know the year in which Jesus was crucified, and
discrepancy exists even with regard to the month.
We do not know where he was crucified, or where
buried. We do not know what happened to his
body after burial. The accounts of his post mortem
appearances to his truant disciples present irrecon-
cilable allegations. Still more startling, the evange-
lists are so sketchy, obscure, or conflicting that we
do not know exactly what claims he made with
respect to his mission on earth.
Besides, when we abandon the New Testament,
and search the contemporary literature of the Roman
^ The Prophet of Nazareth^ Nathaniel Schmidt, pp. 149-150.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 63
Empire, the silence of non- Christian writers is most
remarkable and significant. The first overt refer-
ence to Christianity postdates the probable time of
the Crucifixion by more than eighty years. Still
more disconcerting is the reticence, nay the perplexing
lack of interest, characteristic of Paul. As a conse-
quence, conservative and radical critics are in agree-
ment perforce on one point at least. The facts
necessary for a life of Jesus, in the objective or his-
torical sense, simply do not exist. We are dependent
mainly upon conjecture and inference that involve
us in constant uncertainty. No doubt, Socrates
and Shakespeare present parallel cases. But, even
for the former, no such claims have been advanced
as for Jesus; it was not alleged of Socrates, as of
his pupil Plato, that he had a god to father. Nor
does the astonishing recital close here. The same
inference holds true, substantially, of all the men
who are reputed to have composed the New Testa-
ment. Our information about the greatest of them,
Paul, is most tantalizing in its fragmentariness.
How a man such as he is reported to have been
came to compose the Epistle to the Romans
before 60 a.d. amounts to a first-rate literary mys-
tery. In the same way, we know nothing about the
writers of the First and Second Gospels; nothing,
164 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
except, perhaps, his nationahty and profession, of
the charming litterateur who gave us the Third ; and
nothing at all of the profound genius responsible
for the Fourth. Similarly, too, the eminent theo-
logian who produced the Epistle to the Hebrews
remains anonymous, like the strange seer-anti-
quarian who compiled the Revelation. Of the
authenticity of the less important documents we
know little or nothing.
Nevertheless, such happen to be disconcerting
facts, 'tob little appreciated, often not even appre-
hended, by the usual church-going Christian. We
must needs face the resultant situation as best we
can. For one thing alone stands out perfectly clear.
Thanks to the paucity of biographical material,
later generations drew their own pictures of an ideal
Christ, and threw them back, in default of historical
information. They filled out the vacant past accord-
ing to their hearts' desires, and this without much
reference to a possible historical basis. The oldest
New Testament documents are, even thus early,
illustrations of the process. Little wonder, then,
that Christians are to be found who deny that their
religion took its rise from a historical individual,
and who insist that it "should be regarded as a par-
ticular development of social life, and not as the
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 165
work of a personal founder of a religion";* who
declare : —
"There are narratives in the Bible which are even
more vivid than the Christ-stories in their impression
of personal reality, yet scientific research has defi-
nitely ascertained that there is no historical person-
ality at the base of them. To take two instances
that will be familiar to the general reader, the figures
in the book of Ruth are very sharply defined and
vivid, and the prophet Jonah has a perfect stamp
of individuality. Yet there never was an historical
Ruth or an historical Jonah as described in the story.
Both narratives are entirely the outcome of religious
poetry. They belong to a later Judaic age, and
are intended to meet the increasing chauvinism of
the Jews with the ideas of humanity and interna-
tionalism." ^
In short, thanks to the very barrenness of history,
it has been deemed possible to trace the origin
of Christianity, not to a man, but "to advanced
Jewish thought, or to the philosophy, humanism,
or socialism of Roman imperial times." ^ Briefly,
the conditions in the Roman world were such that
Christianity was bound to have arisen, Jesus or no
Jesus. Extreme though it be, — "a form of pseudo-
^ The Rise of Christianity, Albert Kalthoff, p. 3.
^ Ibid., pp. 14-15. ^ Jesus, Arno Neumann, p. i.
1 66 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
criticism," ^ — this position serves to show the straits
to which the historico-critical movement may re-
duce us.
The complex problems, inseparable from the ca-
nonical sources as we have them, may be illustrated
in yet another way; I mean by reference to the dis-
crepancies that so abound. Time forbids more
than the bare mention of a few of the more simple
cases, and these I set down at random. They
may serve, at least, as examples of many others,
even more perplexing. Take, for example, the pas-
sages in Matthew xi. 2 f., and Luke vii. 18 f. How
are we to interpret the series of miracles related
here? Is the language a statement of objective fact,
or is it a kind of symbolism? The answer would
seem to be, We do not know. For, symbolic language
is often upon Jesus' lips. "Can the blind lead the
blind? Shall they not both fall into the ditch? . . .
And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy
brother's eye, but perceivest not the beam that is in
thine own eye?"^ "It was meet that we should
make merry, and be glad: for this thy brother was
dead, and is alive again: and was lost, and is
found." '
^ An Introduction to the New Testament, Adolf Jiilicher, p. 28.
^ Luke vi. 39, 41. ^ Ihid., xv. 32.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 67
And the famous statement of Mark —
"And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of
the bridechamber fast, while the Bridegroom is with
them? As long as they have the Bridegroom with
them, they cannot fast. But the days will come,
when the Bridegroom shall be taken away from
them, and then shall they fast in those days
55 1
would appear to indicate that, on such occasions,
Jesus has reference to the general situation of re-
newal resultant upon his work. And, if we force an
objective interpretation, how can we reconcile it with
the disclaimers entered in Matthew iv. 5-7; xii.
38-42, in Luke iv. 9-13; xi. 29-32? These
passages illustrate one type of discrepancy.
The following are of a different kind.
{a) Luke's account of the birth at Bethlehem
contains several historical impossibilities and, more-
over, traverses the tradition, implied in the name
"Jesus of Nazareth," that Jesus was born at Naza-
reth.
(b) The discourses reported in the Fourth Gospel
differ so completely from the sayings preserved by
the Synoptists that one must conclude they were
composed by the writer and then placed in Jesus'
mouth by him.
^ ii. 19 f.
1 68 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
(c) A clear development of the baptism story
is traceable from Mark, through Matthew and Luke,
to John. The differences cannot be reconciled save
by recognition of progressive elaboration.
{d) Mark and Luke recount that Jesus held one
view about divorce, Matthew's recital is at variance.
{e) Mark and Matthew tell one thing about the
route taken on the last journey to Jerusalem, Luke
another.
(/) The Synoptists recite words uttered by Jesus
during the agony in the Garden, and yet, almost in
the same breath, we are told that the disciples were
''a stone's cast from him," and overcome with sleep.
Who heard him, then? If the account be credible,
plainly we know nothing about these words.
{g) Luke tells us that the Last Supper was eaten
on the 14th Nisan, John says the date was the 13th.
It is well to warn ourselves that this discrepancy
has nothing to do with historical fact; it can be
traced, however, to doctrinal prepossession.
Qi) The Synoptists disagree in their reports
of Jesus' words on the cross; and John records a
conversation of Jesus with Mary, and "the disciple
whom he loved," — who were not present at the time !
(i) The accounts of the resurrection contradict
each other, and Paul's recital is not in accord with
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 69
that of any one of the evangehsts. There was no
eye-witness of the event, all the disciples had
fled into Galilee. On the evidence as we have it,
two questions can be asked legitimately. Did Jesus
rise from the dead in a literal physical way? Or,
did the disciples, their atmosphere being what it
was, come to believe inevitably that he had so risen?
Which is the fact?
(y) How can we reconcile the account of the post-
mortem appearance to the disciples at Emmaus (Luke
xxiv. 13 f.) with the information, given presumably
by the same writer, in Acts i. i f . ?
{k) How can we fit the discrepant tales about
the death of Judas, furnished respectively in Mat-
thew xxvii. 3 f. and Acts i. 15 f. ? *
(l) Similarly, it is impossible, on any historical
basis, to collate the story of Paul's life after his con-
version, as given in Acts, with his own account
(presumably), as given in Galatians.
Thus it seems to follow, from a historico-critical
investigation of the documents, that they are not to
be taken as histories in any strict modern sense;
and that to read them in this fashion is to commit
grave error, fraught with dangerous consequences.
^ The probability is that both can be traced to the legend of
Nadan, nephew of Ahikar, grand vizier of Sennacherib.
lyo MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
In a word, the historical element is mixed with other
factors that tend to transform it, and this in ascer-
tainable ways. We may attempt to understand the
matter by reference to the influence exercised by
the Old Testament upon the men of the New,
especially upon Jesus himself.
We are well aware that Jewish culture was not
submerged in the huge sea of Roman-Hellenistic
civilization, although it suffered dilution. In this
connexion it is important to note that, so far as we
know, all the New Testament authors were Jews,
except the writer of the Third Gospel and the Acts
of the Apostles. Hence a paramount consideration,
forgotten 'too frequently even by professed students
of theology. The New Testament cannot be under-
stood apart from apprehension of Semitic modes of
thought, especially as crystallized in the sacred litera-
ture of the Hebrews. Here I can do no more than
indicate the subtle, all-pervading tendency imparted
by the Old Testament.
The intricate problems of interaction between
subjective ideas and objective events, inseparable
from the sources as they have come down to us,
require that we remember the part played by the
Jewish Scriptures, — they provided the norms for-
mative of life and applied to the valuation of conduct.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 171
They offered a set view, not merely of the duties
pertinent to the individual man, but also of the destiny
reserved for the people. In particular, they furnished
an explanation of God's nature, and earthly govern-
ment. Briefly, every Jew, Jesus like the rest, was born
into a well-marked spiritual penumbra. Such Psalms
as the ii, xviii, xx, xxi, xlv, Ixiii, ex, cxii, to name only a
few, were susceptible of Messianic interpretation ; and
the same held of numerous passages in the other
writings. A vast system had grown up round the
Scriptures that intertwined everywhere with common
aft'airs. Nothing could escape it, from the most
ordinary trivialities of the daily round to the sublimest
aspirations fathered by man. Besides, all this had
wrought itself into the very marrow of Jewish culture,
not by reference to a racial philosophy of history alone,
but rather because the sacred books themselves formed
the chief staple of national education. As Josephus
says, "Moses had commanded that the children
should be brought up in the knowledge of these Scrip-
tures that relate to the laws." That is, the Old
Testament supplied more than a theory of existence, —
it had become the instrument of ethical and religious
discipline. To hear, to read, to recite, to transcribe
the Scriptures, — this was the royal road to learning,
as in Mohammedan Cairo, say, at the present moment.
172 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Apart altogether from any question of its influence
over the nascent Christian faith, we can trace the
Old Testament everywhere in the New, just because
the Jewish youth were nurtured on it. Accordingly,
we shall not be surprised to find its atmosphere
present always to Jesus. When the Pharisees re-
proved his disciples, because they plucked wheat on
the Sabbath day, Jesus took appeal to Scripture his-
tory. That memory played him false about the
high priest's name (Mark ii. 26), that he was unaware
these regulations postdated David's time, makes no
difference. He enforced his opinion by the norms
familiar to his people; in Matthew's version, he
cited Hosea vi. 6, and no further justification
of his followers was necessary. In the same way,
when Matthew made Jesus enter Jerusalem sitting
on an ass and her colt, he was simply following too
faithfully Zechariah's statement: "Behold thy king
Cometh unto thee . . . riding upon an ass, even upon
a colt the foal of an ass" (ix. 9). The Synoptist
stuck to the letter of a language which plainly had
faded from use. But the prophecy must be fulfilled.
When a misunderstood linguistic usage is turned
thus into what purports to be an historical event, we
are in a position to judge of the immense leverage
exerted by the Old Testament.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 73
Thus, for Jesus, the recitals and doctrines of the
Scriptures constituted standards of judgement and
appeal. His heedless contemporaries stand in like
case with the sinners of Noah's day (Mt. xxiv. 37 f.,
Luke xvii. 26 f .) ; historicity counted for nothing.
When he was confronted by the disciples of John,
who asked, ''Art thou he that cometh, or look we
for another? " he replied with quotations from Isaiah
(xxxv. 5 f. ; Ixi. i) . In the Beatitudes he quoted from
Psalm xxxvii. When he cleansed the temple (Mark
xi. 17), he employed a phrase derived from Jere-
miah (vii. 11). When he discussed "washings of
cups, and pots, and brazen vessels " with the Phari-
sees (Mark vii. 4 f.), he cited Isaiah (xxix. 13).
Isaiah v. i f. is entwined with the parable of the
man who planted a vineyard (Mark xii. i f .) . When
Jesus took a meal with the publican (Mt. ix. 13) , he
appealed again to Hosea. He denied the Davidic
descent of Messiah by reference to Psalm ex, without
any qualms of conscience about David's possible
authorship. So, too, he proved the resurrection of
the dead (Mark xii. 26) by pleading in evidence Ex-
odus iii. 2, 6 ! When he made his entry into Jerusa-
lem, after the manner predicted of Messiah, he found
justification in Isaiah (Ixii. 11). When he com-
mented upon the execution of John Baptist (Mark
174 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
ix. 13), he recalled i Kings (xix. 2, 10), or, more
probably, a lost apocryphon represented by the Sla-
vonic Antiquities of Pseudo-Philo. When he silenced
the Tempter (Mt. iv. 10), he was reminiscent of
Deuteronomy (vi. 13) ; while the Tempter, when he
urged Jesus to cast himself down from the pinnacle
of the temple (Luke iv. 10), quoted from Psalm
xci. II f. Similar instances might be multipHed
easily. Suffice it to indicate that, when he passed
through the crises in his career, Jesus reverted con-
stantly to the Hebrew Scriptures; even at the last
dreadful moment on the cross, as Mark reports, he
repeated the first verse of Psalm xxii.
So it is no way astonishing to find that the Old
Testament worms itself into the very tissue of the
New, — into Matthew and John, into the speeches
of Peter, and Philip, and Stephen in Acts, into
the sublime constructions of the Pauline Epistles;
and that the Revelation summarizes age-old, pos-
sibly esoteric, expectations of Semitism as they
took peculiar form in the Palestinian consciousness.
Now, the Old Testament could be thus absorbed
into the New, given certain conditions. If the New
Testament were not primarily a history, if mere quo-
tation from the ancient Scriptures could constitute
irrefragable proof, could be put in place of real events,
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 175 '
could clinch doctrine by simple citation, then the pro-
cess, as we know it, could have taken place; not
otherwise. It becomes plain, accordingly, that this
very relation of the later to the earlier documents
forbids us to estimate the New Testament as a work
intended for a plain, unadorned, historic recital. I
need hardly remind you that the average '' Bible
student," so called, has little or no knowledge of
this elementary — and elemental — fact.
4. Christian Syncretism
Finally, the historico-critical movement has shown
that, just as the early Christian consciousness sus-
tained itself upon the Old Testament, so, within a
generation after the Crucifixion, it began to adopt and
adapt ideas current in the Hellenistic world. Like
Buddhism, Christianity is a highly syncretist religion.
Primitive devotion to Jesus originated in an en-
vironment where Jewish (scriptural) notions reigned
supreme. But, even here, other factors found place.
The long association with Greek civilization, dating
from the time of Alexander the Great (331 B.C.),
must be taken into account. The presence of Orien-
tal influences, particularly in eschatological doctrine,
is highly probable, while infiltration from the religions
of Babylonia, and possibly of the Farther East,
176 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
amounts to a certainty. Yet, even so, the Jewish
element preserved itself decisive. But, when the
new religion migrated into Roman-Hellenistic circles,
it was confronted by two systems, whose complete
domination and importance can hardly be exagger-
ated. One of these controlled the world of theor}-,
the other that of practice. The Roman Empire
developed its spiritual life within the atmosphere of
a perplexing conglomeration of ideas, doctrines, and
aspirations compounded from Plato and later Greek
thought, from the theosophical tendencies induced
by Oriental moods, and from the peculiar drift of the
spirit of the age. So, too, on the practical side, a
great concourse of secret cult-societies honeycombed
Mediterranean Europe. Devotees of the ancient
Chthonic Mysteries abounded, because initiation was
now a privilege open to all Roman citizens. The
occult rites of Egyptian and Phrygian deities flour-
ished luxuriantly, as we know from the satirists.
"The Orontes had flowed into the Tiber." To these
must be added the worship of the Emperors, and
the peculiar situation in the Jewish Diaspora. Con-
trasted as they were, and appealing primarily to
different groups in the community, the system of
ideas and the crowd of religious observances did not
circle apart on separate orbits. For, similar aspira-
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 177
lions, fruit of identical human problems, swayed
both theory and practice. Nor can this leaven be
said to have differed irremediably from some leanings
germinal, if no more at first, in Christian belief.
Moreover, reconciliation saturated the spiritual at-
mosphere. Briefly, ideal motives, remarkable in
their family likeness, affected all men, just because,
moved by immense and missionary zeal. Christians
could not stand aside, and stay untouched. Conse-
quently, labile Christianity, as it insinuated itself
rapidly into the syncretist stream, absorbed material
quite foreign to its native (Jewish scriptural) charac-
ter: this was inevitable.
For example, the Jewish Messianic expectation
came to be allegorized by the Logos doctrine, derived
from Plato, the Stoics, and Philo. The theosophical
necessity for a mediator between God and the world
replaced the hope that a great man would appear,
commissioned to lead the earth to righteousness,
as the Scriptures had foretold. Thus, in effect, the
syncretist conception of the incarnate Christ eclipsed
the humane career of the historical Jesus. As one
of the most learned among Anglican divines has
remarked : —
"The conception of Christ as the Wisdom and the
Power of God seemed inconsistent with the meanness
N
1 78 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of a common human life; and that life resolved itself
into a series of symbolic representations of superhuman
movements, and the record of it was written in hi-
eroglyphs." ^
Accordingly, a new God — not the Hebrew
Yahweh, and a new Son of God — not the Jewish
Messiah, achieved predominance in the Chris-
tian consciousness, and the doctrinal developments
that were to differentiate Christianity so sharply
from its Semitic forerunner displayed themselves
quickly. The theory of Virgin-birth was adopted.
The notion of divine paternity, so familiar to the
Roman-Hellenistic world, so repugnant to the Jew,
entered upon its fateful career. It guaranteed the
efficacy of the mediation and salvation that lay close
to the heart of multitudes of Roman citizens, drawn
from every name under heaven. The Christian
community possessed itself of a mystic notion that
enabled it to respond to a popular demand and, at
the same time, raised this to the purer altitude of
its own vitalizing hope. In other words, a highly
speculative doctrine replaced unmalleable historical
events. The resurrection ''on the third day" of the
Phrygian Attis-cult, and of the Egyptian Osiris-cult,
proof of the vicarious, victorious suffering of these
^ The Hihhert Lectures, 1888, Edwin Hatch, D.D., p. 75.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 79
gods; the part played by the underworld in the
Chthonic Mysteries; the obscure legends of Semitic
apocalypse, connected with the Hebrew Abaddon and
Antichrist, passed over to the Christians, and attained
new consecration at their hands. The regnant the-
ory of the Roman-Hellenistic world operated to these
marvellous ends.
In like manner, the practical situation wrought
strange consequences. The religious guilds, — Thiasoi,
Eranoij or Orgeones, — palpitating with fiducial en-
thusiasm, filled with zeal for moral reformation after
their kind, read a lesson to Christians that they could
not ignore. The Christian societies tended to assimi-
late themselves to these fraternities, just as, in any
community, at any time and in any place, a new asso-
ciation will follow naturally the lines drawn by organ-
izations already in possession of the field. So it is
nowise wonderful to find that, little as Sabazius or
Mithra, Serapis or Isis had in common with the ethi-
cal, non-thaumaturgic Judaism of Jesus, romanic
Christians could not but be drawn by the success of
competing and older clubs. Further, this tendency
proved the more unavoidable that the worshippers
of Mithra and the rest expected to obtain mortal puri-
fication and immortal life by reason of their devotion.
Moreover, the god of the Thiasos had secured these
l8o MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
benefits for his worshippers by personal suffering
and death. The chastisement of their peace was
upon him; with his stripes they were healed. So
close was the spiritual parallelism that, as scholars
have observed, had the religion of Mithra conquered
the Roman world, as seemed possible at one crisis,
Christianity would have descended to us very much in
the guise which the Mithraic cult now presents to
these investigators ! Most naturally, then, the great
Mithraic festival of Sol Invictus (spiritualized as
the Sun of Righteousness) became Christmas Day; *
the period between the death and resurrection of
Jesus, assigned by the Gospels, was that of the Osiris-
cult, just as the period, of different length, between
Good Friday and Easter Day, agreed with the tri-
duum of the Attis-Cybele festival. As the Christian
community came to be composed more and more of
Roman citizens, perfectly familiar with the organiza-
tion, methods, and aims of the mystery-cults, so cus-
toms passed insensibly from the elder to the younger
societies. "The four forms of Christian belief which
we have been considering are the Virgin-birth of
Jesus Christ, His Descent into the nether world, His
^ It is a well-known fact that Eastern Christians {e.g. at Edessa)
objected to the "idolatry" involved in the adoption of Christmas
Day by the Roman community.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST l8l
Resurrection, and His Ascension. On the ground
of facts supplied by archaeology, it is plausible to hold
that all these arose out of a pre-Christian sketch of
the life, death, and exaltation of the expected Messiah,
itself ultimately derived from a widely current mythic
tradition respecting a solar deity." ^
In the same way, the belief, current universally
among the thiasic initiates, that the Redeemer-God
must die, not only exercised profound influence over
the direction taken by Christian belief and speculation,
but also induced modifications of practice, as in Bap-
tism and the Last Supper. We find, for instance,
that, until this widespread idea had time to operate,
— till about the close of the second century, — the
abstract theory of the deity of Jesus received no fixed
interpretation; in like manner, the doctrine of the
Holy Spirit fluctuated freely for six or seven genera-
tions. So, too, the powerful conception of unity with
other men in communion with a common deity,
highly characteristic of the Roman-Hellenistic cults,
made itself felt in the evolution of Christian practice.
Baptism assumed the nature of an operative process;
it became '^ enlightenment," "a seal," exactly as in
the mysteries; it filled the office of an ''initiation"
^ Bible Problems, T. K. Cheyne, D.D., Professor of Interpreta-
tion of Holy Scripture at Oxford, p. 128.
1 82 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
ceremony; while the baptismal formula assimilated
itself to a "password," admitting the bearer to special
privileges. The exorcism and anointment with oil,
that came to be accompaniments of the rite, are
traceable to the same source. False gods were ab-
jured, and sins washed away, as in the thiasic ritual;
in short, a thaumaturgic efi&cacy was imported thence.
Likewise, in the Supper, the elements themselves
became ''mysteries"; the conception of sacrifice
attained predominance; the sacramental reference
occupied a chief place ; and the necessity for a priestly
intermediary formulated itself. The gulf fixed be-
tween the simplicity of the Gospel meal and the
syncretized Christian eucharist, resultant upon Ro-
man-Hellenistic infiltration, may be inferred from the
following mystic narrative of Dionysius Areopagites.
''AH the other initiations are incomplete without
this. The consummation and crown of all the rest
is the participation of him who is initiated in the the-
archic mysteries. For though it be the common
characteristic of all the hierarchic acts to make the
initiated partakers of the divine light, yet this alone
imparted to me the vision through whose mystic
light, as it were, I am guided to the contemplation
of the other sacred things. . . . The sacred hierarch
initiates the sacred prayer and announces to all the
holy peace: and after all have saluted each other,
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 83
the mystic recital of the sacred lists is completed.
The hierarch and the priests wash their hands in
water; he stands in the midst of the divine altar,
and around him stand the priests and the chosen
ministers. The hierarch sings the praises of the
divine working and consecrates the most divine mys-
teries, and by means of the symbols which are sacredly
set forth, he brings into open vision the things of which
he sings the praises. And when he has shown the
gifts of the divine working, he himself comes into a
sacred communion with them, and then invites the
rest. And having both partaken and given to the
others a share in the thearchic communion, he ends
with a sacred thanksgi\dng ; and while the people
bend over what are divine symbols only, he himself,
always by the thearchic spirit, is led in a priestly
manner, in purity of his godlike frame of mind,
through blessed and spiritual contemplation, to the
holy realities of the mysteries.'
55 1
Thus, as Hatch points out, ''the whole conception
of Christian worship was changed. But it was
changed by the influence upon Christian worship of
the mysteries and the concurrent cults." ^ One need
only compare, say, even Luke's description of the
Last Supper with the theurgic presentation given
above, to realize how true this is.
^ Quoted from Hatch's Hibberi Lectures, pp. 303, 304.
^ Ibid., p. 309.
184 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Finally, the full consequences of this syncretist
process crystallized in the creeds. The transfor-
mation of the early faith was so profound that, even
in the simplest of our ''symbols" (a word, by the
way, taken from the mysteries) , the so-called Apostles'
Creed, there is nothing, in all likelihood, which Jesus
would have understood after the credal sense, except,
probably, ''the life everlasting" and, possibly, a
certain aspect of the resurrection article. And the
creed, recollect, is but "the baptismal formula en-
larged" ^ — the password, as it were, to the "greater
mystery," whereof the Eleusinian initiate could ex-
claim: "I have fasted; I have drunk the kykeon;
I have taken out of the kiste; and after having tasted
I have deposited in the kalathos.''^ ^ Thus the beg-
garly elements of a less spiritual faith were baptized
into the Christian consciousness. "The base things
of the world, and the things that are despised, did
God choose, yea and the things that are not, that
he might bring to nought the things that are." ^
^ Cf. The Apostles' Creed, A. Harnack, in The Nineteenth
Century, vol. xxxiv, pp. 158 f.
^ The Eleusinian Mysteries, Francois Lenormant, in The
Contemporary Review, vol. xxxviii, p. 144. Kykeon — the re-
freshing draught ; a sacred cake was taken out of the kiste = the
box or chest, touched and tasted, then returned to the kalathos =
wicker basket.
^ I Corinthians i. 28.
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 85
Such, then, appear to be some results and tenden-
cies of the historico-critical movement regarding
Ancient History, the Old and New Testaments, and
the Origins of Christianity. Sketchy as my summary
perforce is, it may suffice to indicate the direction taken
by research ; and to render this unmistakable, I have
set the material in high light. Further, many of the
most distinguished scholars are banded, in a world-
wide fellowship, to attack details that still remain
obscure. The end is not yet, one dare not forecast
the ultimate inferences upon disputed points. Never-
theless, it needs no argument to show that the move-
ment has arrived, and arrived to stay. The labour
of a century has not proved vain, and only a Mrs.
Partington would deal with it after her fashion. The
fait accompli stands forth to such purpose that the
hazards of belief assume a fresh guise, one quite
unprecedented.
"... Mortalia facta peribunt,
Nedum sermonum stet honos et gratia vivax."
Applied in this thoroughgoing style to the august
construction of Christian dogma and doctrinal legend,
the historico-critical movement, with its strict induc-
tive methods, appears to produce veritable "humilia-
tion in the midst." Notwithstanding, even if many
problems rest unsettled, we are bound to remember
1 86 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
that, after all, this type of investigation has little more
than started. As years go by, it cannot fail to reap
larger results, agreed upon by those who have earned
the right to speak with authority, and backed by
evidences that are sure to move thoughtful, candid
men. Lengthened observation and reflexion have led
me to conclude that, in spite of its present fluid state,
we are destined to reckon with it. In any case, it is
quite certain that the old elevation of doctrine and in-
tellectual assent above life and moral worth must go by
the board. Festooned with sacred memories as the
ancient props are, a worse thing than this glimpse of
historical truth may well befall us, if we persist in
blindness to their real nature. Assuredly, in these
days of popular education, the laity will come to know
the facts, and cease to rest satisfied with garbled
accounts of them; it matters little whether the
garbling be undertaken in the interests of confessional
orthodoxy or of propagandist rationalism. Slowly
but surely the new knowledge is permeating society,
and, as surely, accordant measures are, or will become,
a clamant want. The parting of the ways will arrive,
later if not sooner. Men in whose lives religion plays
a vital role have need of all the courage and love of
truth at their disposal. For, to be explicit, organized
Christianity has been called to trial upon two counts,
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 87
both of paramount importance to the twentieth cen-
tury. On the one hand, the church must make up
its mind whether or no its mission possesses meaning
in relation to the democratic movement, rumbhng
underground now, destined to speak out full-throated
to-morrow. It must decide whether its preaching
is to take cognizance primarily of a possible life be-
yond the grave, or is, first of all, to concentrate upon
the sublime petition, "Thy kingdom come; Thy will
be done, in earth, as it is in heaven." With this,
these Lectures do not concern themselves. On the
other hand, the church must make up its mind whether
the permanent elements of religion are to remain
fettered, perhaps stultified, by hypotheses relevant
in the fourth century, or are capable of plangent
statement in terms of our contemporary outlook upon
the world and life. In some respects, the latter is
the most difficult problem before our generation.
Like all difficult and immense things, its historical
course has been most complex and tortuous. So
much so that one cannot say, lo here or lo there it
took rise. Likewise, its saecular trend, unhasting,
unresting, still sweeps towards maturity. It awaits
the alembic of a seminal personality, as we await the
epiphany of its Plato or Augustine, of its Newton or
Hegel. In short, no one but a great genius, of an
1 88 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
individualized type superfluous or impossible in a
former age, can transform the mysterious perspec-
tives of belief. For he alone is able to bring forth
from the treasures of heart and brain things both
new and old.
But, be all this as it will, thus far we have not con-
fronted our third 'universe.' So, in the Lectures
to come, I shall ask you to reflect with me upon
certain aspects of the religious and ethical conscious-
ness. Possibly some glimpses may be vouchsafed
us, if not of an undiscovered country, at least of a
dimension of experience that eludes the strait canons
dear to history. Yet, even this essay is sore beset by
manifold difficulties, and encompassed with wander-
ing lights. Indeed, these happen to be incidents
wrought into the central importance of the subject
for our common humanity.
''All I could never be,
All, men ignored in me,
This, I was worth to God, Whose wheel the pitcher shaped."
Yea, verily! But, how to elicit this? How to con-
vey it in the poor show of words, so apt to mumble
or slur the quintessential? These mobile, ethereal
tremors, and all the solemn questions they evoke,
disclose the basal, poignant afflictions that hover
about our paradoxical lot. I beg earnestly that you
HUMILIATION IN THE MIDST 1 89
will realize the slipperiness of the possible foothold
and, realizing, bear with my constant stumbles.
Note. — The following works are readily available for readers
of English who wish to pursue the subject farther. An Intro-
duction to the New Testament, A. Jiilicher (Smith, Elder and
Co., London); The First Three Gospels, J. Estlin Carpenter
(Sunday School Association, London) ; The Johannine Writings,
Paul W. Schmiedel (Macmillan Co., New York) ; The Fourth
Gospel, its Purpose and Theology, Ernest F. Scott (Scribner, New
York); The Life of Jesus, Oscar Holtzmann (Macmillan Co.,
New York) ; The Sources of Our Knowledge of the Life of Jesus,
Paul Wernle (Philip Green, London) ; Jesus, W. Bousset (G. P.
Putnam's Sons, New York) ; Jesus, Arno Neumann (Macmillan
Co., New York); Paul, W. Wrede (Philip Green, London);
Exploratio Evangelica, A Brief Examination of the Basis and
Origin of Christian Belief, Percy Gardner (G. P. Putnam's Sons,
New York) ; The Beginnings of Christianity, Paul Wernle (G. P.
Putnam's Sons, New York) ; The Influence of Greek Ideas and
Usages upon the Christian Church, Edwin Hatch (Hibbert Lec-
tures for 1888, Williams and Norgate, London) ; The New
Testament Articles in the Encyclopcedia Biblica (Macmillan Co.,
New York). Messrs. Williams and Norgate, London, or Messrs.
G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York, will furnish upon application a
list of the works constituting the Crown Theological Library,
which are admirably suited for all laymen interested in the Chris-
tian religion and kindred topics.
LECTURE V
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD
As we approach our further enquiry, let me say
at once that I do not intend to elaborate a critical
argument. In other words, I shall make no formal
attack upon the technical conclusions of the scientific
consciousness. This were absurd and, for the phi-
losophy, superfluous. So far as our generation is
concerned, it can afford to rest content with Professor
Ward's rigorous analysis of Naturalism.^ More-
over, in another place, I have committed myself to
the opinion : —
"As regards the mechanical theory, in particular,
Dr. Ward's treatment may be taken as final. . . .
The mechanical theory, the theory of mechanical
evolution, and the theory of psychological parallelism
fail as accounts of the universe as a whole. They
can be proved insufficient and abstract, or partisan
and illogical. . . . The account of the manner in
which the mechanical theory turns itself inside out in
^ Cf. Naturalism and Agnosticism, James Ward, especially
vol. i.
190
THE FREEST ABLISHED DISCORD 191
the inevitable course of its historical development
is masterly to a degree, and the same may be allowed
of the measure meted to the half-monisms associated
with the 'new' psychology. In the criticism of the
theory of mechanical evolution the work rises to a
very high level of dialectical skill." ^
This view I continue to affirm.
Nor shall I assault the findings of the historico-
critical method. On the face of it, an amateur must
admit the competence of a factual science within its
own range. On the contrary, my desire is rather to
elaborate a point of view, one that may serve, pos-
sibly, to stress activities of the ethico-religious life
which contemporary studies and methods have
tended to obscure, and have, as I believe, minimized.
Since Thales and his successors in Greece, thought
has travelled many a spiral round, with infinite
pains. Generally, it has passed from a vague cos-
mological standpoint, through a molar-mechanical
one, to a molecular universe so ramified and elusive
in its parts that the necessity for traffic with first
principles seems to have lost emphasis. We need
to circle back upon concrete experience, armed,
however, with the ampler views won so hardly on
^ The American Journal of Theology, vol. iv, p. 136 (in a review
of the above).
192 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
many levels. Science was made by man, it is his
instrument, never his master. And from this judge-
ment no species of science, natural or human, can
claim exemption.
Nevertheless, it were impossible to overlook the
issues raised in the previous Lectures. The apposi-
tions between science and religion, between criticism
and faith, furnish a large element to the preestab-
lished discord that has afHicted man immemorially —
never more keenly than at this good hour. To
gain anything like a steady view of the situation on
the whole, we must refuse to be upset by the insistent
clamour of discrepant voices. This or that aspect
of a matter may well disguise, nay conceal, the matter
itself. The vast extension of knowledge in detail
admonishes seriously to calm reflexion upon the
immanent unity. If the fuller apprehension of
nature and human qualities, acquired these last
hundred years, compel us to recognize that the
internal mystery has shifted its centre, it intimates
also, and no less decisively, that mystery abides much
as before. One method of solution, one path of
escape, may have been foreclosed. That is all.
What method or path ? Let me reply, provisionally,
as follows (I say, provisionally, because I happen to
know theologians who could state an excellent case
THE FREEST ABLISHED DISCORD 1 93
for their own view, who are equipped fully to look
after it) . Remembering this, then, suppose we take
it for granted that the theological constructions,
common to organized Christianity, are not reconcil-
able with modern knowledge; suppose we agree to
treat them, as of historical interest only. I suggest
this line for two reasons. On the one hand, and
theoretically, many scientific authorities, followed by
more students, think thus — the theological attitude
is prima facie suspect with them. Therefore, they
conclude that the Christian religion must go by the
board. Whether this view, advocated openly by
some few, subconscious with a great company, can
be maintained, we need not stop to ask. On the
other hand, and practically, this course is open to
me, because I am. a layman, as it was not open to the
clergymen who preceded me, as it may not be open
to those who follow. Accordingly, let us drop the
creeds frankly, on the alleged ground that they
conflict irremediably with the conclusions of the
scientific consciousness and of the historico-critical
method. If we proceed thus, the question arises,
Have we thereby dismissed "Christian truth"?
The point of viev/ I shall attempt to develop must
confront this problem. In other words, we abandon
the apologetic '' defence of Christian truth," as formu-
194 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
lated traditionally, in favour of an effort after "the
establishment of Christian truth" by appeal to the
constitution and active career of human self-con-
sciousness. Our last 'universe' falls to be explored.
In the Introductory Lecture we had occasion to
see that ''man's distinctive mark" proceeds from his
double nature. The paradox happens to be that
need and opportunity, failure and fulfilment, root in
identical conditions. Calm the storm and stress
thus originated, and religion would lose all meaning.
Somewhere within its recesses, the character of
every mature person responds to the heart-breaking
sigh stereotyped in the words "the good that I
would I do not : but the evil which I would not, that
I do." Sooner or later, a human being is forced to
comment thus, and, as a rule, upon events of the last
importance to him.
"Life, like a dome of many-coloured glass,
Stains the white radiance of eternity."
Why? Simply because the career, wherein our lot
expresses itself, appears unable to happen otherwise.
Nay, the more significant it becomes in individual
cases, the more it tends to illustrate this condemna-
tion. We are driven, therefore, to expose the terms
of the contrast in some detail.
No one needs to be told that, at present, it is cus-
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 1 95
tomary to represent the conflict in but one of several
possible ways, and this rather to the exclusion of
others. Not only from popular parlance, but also
from the charmed language of ' the schools,' we are
apt to discover the opposition outlined broadly thus.
The universe is two ultimately. One recognizes —
"that he has two sources of information, — his
senses and his inner consciousness. When reflecting
upon the mental processes by which the materials
supplied by the senses are worked into thought, the
Mind is watching its own activities. By self-study
a man acquires a knowledge of knowing, thoughts
about thinking. He knows that he possesses con-
sciousness. It is not that he is consciousness —
merely a concomitant of a certain kind of nerve-
activity. He owns a consciousness which he can
direct and control; from which it follows that there
is a He to own it. But the two sources of information
must never be confused. The lines of thought for
which the external and the internal worlds supply
materials are parallel and neither diverging nor
converging lines. A man's consciousness gives him
no more information with regard to his science than
his senses give him with regard to his consciousness.
The two worlds are absolutely and permanently
distinct." ^
^ Some Problems of the Day in Natural Science: An Intro-
duction, Alex. Hill, pp. 26-27.
196 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
The physical, or energy, the psychical, or conscious-
ness, present themselves as disparate orders, neither
reducible to the other. And, when the individual
comes in question, what holds of the macrocosm
reappears in the microcosm. The body, with its
neuroses, stands over against the 'soul,' with its
psychoses. No causal relation between them exists
to afford convenient union, and so a symbolic repre-
sentation of their final unity laughs us ironically into
compulsory contentment of uneasiness. Flatly, the
irreducibles remain irreducible. Doubtless, evidence
abounds for this conclusion, if you regard the phe-
nomena in a certain way. But, evidence or no, the
demonstration lacks power to reveal the situation in
detail. For, in the first place, it is obviously an
abstract reflexion upon life rather than an exhibition
of processes in concrete ; and, in the second place, it
is a judgement on the whole, or in gross. Putting
the matter otherwise, we may well ask. Does self-
consciousness in any of its aspects, except the in-
tellectual possibly, show up thus? Is the artistic,
or the ethical, or the social, or the psychological, or
the religious interest amenable to this presentation,
and to no other? I think we are bound to reply in
the negative. At all events, convenient as it may be
to convey synoptically what appears an ultimate
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 197
opposition, we have earned no right to rest in such a
proposition prior to some enquiry about constituent
factors and about definite presuppositions. Nay,
one might be justified in the further allegation that
not all evidence tells in just this single direction.
Is the savage oppressed by the break, or the child?
Is the average man, in normal moments, burdened
invariably by a profound sense that ' the physical' and
* the psychical ' lock in deadly strife ? Is he even aware
from hour to hour that they fall apart, to move on
separate planes ? Briefly, is it not true that practice,
in large, declines to confirm this theory in large?
Without attempting to pursue the problem, we must
admit at least that doubt exists. Accordingly, it
were more to our point — the investigation of
the ethico-religious consciousness — to dismiss this
method of approach, approved currently though it
be, and attempt another line, one less general, more
calculated to follow the mazes of the plain day's
work.
Fortunately, perhaps, we are relieved from search
for a beginning, our course thus far having left no
choice. The previous enquiry has served to elicit
grave, if not alarming, contradictions between the
deliberate inferences of the scientific consciousness
and the historico-critical method, on the one hand,
198 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
and the naive beliefs of numerous — average repre-
sentative — Christians, on the other. Indeed, as
we have noticed, this preestabhshed discord con-
tributes a main element to the unrest of contempo-
rary culture. Strange as the idea may appear, the
best way to attempt a resolution lies along the path
of further contact with discord. For, as yet, its
possible implications have been kept in the back-
ground. Thus, we may set out by asking. Does the
conflict characteristic of human experience become
deeper when you pursue it into such details as natural
science and exact history supply than it proves daily
in the broad simplicities of common sense and even
of popular philosophy ? Are not science and ' causal '
history themselves under a greater condemnation —
one of the same kind, but acuter, because more
explicit? Granted all their results, have they it in
their power to assuage the yearning that produces
religion? And, if not, can these very results
remain unaffected in our judgement, especially with
regard to claims, made for them by many, as vehicles
of 'explanation'? We shall try to catch a glimpse
of the principle suggested by these questions ere we
proceed, in our next Lecture, to grapple with the
ethical consciousness itself.
When we review experience, we are struck forth-
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 1 99
with by the vast complexity of quite obvious ramifica-
tions. Life has differentiated itself on all sides; it
revels exuberantly in exfoliating interests, many of
them prone to dominate at different points or amid
various circumstances. The primitive union of
religion with custom and law, with government and
morals, with philosophy and science, such as patri-
archal story attests, corresponds to no actual situation
in modern society. As a consequence, one activity
may play the title-role on occasion, nay, come to
masquerade as if it were experience in to to. The
absorbed scholar, the skilful physician, the busy
merchant, the ubiquitous politician fall under strong
temptation to rate everything as intellectual merely, or
physical, or commercial, or amenable to compromise.
In every case the same implication rules; men tend
to treat the familiar as if it were normative, to sup-
pose that the truth dwells within their sphere of
influence. Thus, when we take appeal to experience
we must realize, and, if need be, force ourselves to
realize, that this centrifugal movement sets our
worst puzzles. For example, nobody requires close
intimacy with the votaries of the sciences to learn
that they evince a habit of assigning prime importance
to their respective pursuits. Much of the good-
natured chaff that sweetens academic life, not a little
200 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of the acidity that sometimes sours it, run back to
this palpable fact. Briefly, thanks to the progressive
subdivision of experience, consequent upon ampler
recognition of its tortuousness, any truth may be
elevated readily to the plane of the truth. Let us
probe this curious development a little more deeply.
Advance in knowledge depends upon awareness of
problems, of contradictions. Science, as a process
of investigation, consists in an effort to erase these
blots upon consistency; as a system, complete so far,
it surveys conditions of consistency in a particular
field. If we find that a series of related judgements
agree among themselves and, in addition, do not
traverse other judgements proven empirically, we
are entitled to allege that we possess a fragment of
truth. Yet, such is the shiftiness of events that wt
must divide in order to conquer. But division, it so
happens, implies much more than one notes com-
monly. Of course, on the face of it, to divide means
to select, to choose a part from the whole. One
fails to see as readily that the choice leads also to
manipulation of the part in a specific way. Method
arrives upon the scene. For, why choose? The
physicist, to cite a case, preserves discreet silence
about the odours, colours, and tastes of his objects.
His world, when organized in truth, turns out some-
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 20I
thing totally different from the world patent to the
average man. The plain inferences of common sense
occupy no place here. Nevertheless, your physicist
not only can, but does, enjoy eau de Cologne, beau
brocade, and chartreuse with the same zest as his
guileless neighbour. His science knows nothing
about such qualities; at the same time, the qualities
remain in his experience exactly as in that of the hon
viveur. It demands no insight to understand why —
they have been disregarded pure and simple. Now,
no science could remain science on the basis of
such cavalier procedure. So it becomes apparent
immediately that they have been disregarded for
apposite reasons. Physics confines itself deliber-
ately to quantitative investigations of special events
in experience. By this self-denying ordinance its
exponents hope to formulate results that would be
beyond reach were qualitative differences permitted
to intervene. That is, to conquer, the enquirer di-
vides and, by consequence, holds the division for
absolute in some directions. And if, as all would
admit at once, physics be a more ' exact ' science than
biology, the reason lurks here. Biological material,
by its very constitution, defies us to omit qualitative
reference without ceremony. New qualities do pre-
sent themselves, which cannot be foreseen like '' prop-
202 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
erties of matter." Hence, plainly, the larger part
played by mathematics in physical science and, on
the contrary, the greater constructive importance of
experiment in biology. Thus selection proves to be
no hare choice, it spills over into angle of outlook and
method of procedure, both adopted with conscious
intent.
I hope I have made it clear that anything worthy
the name science — be it astronomy, chemistry,
psychology, or history — proceeds upon a specific
agreement a quo. Experience must submit to dis-
ruption if truths be in demand. As matter of record,
every science adopts this plan at the outset. But
the rank and file even of educated men fail to notice
that the plan conditions the conclusion also. For
instance, I am quite able to follow the chemist when
he says that an atom of copper or of oxygen is capable
of conveying a quantity of electricity twice as great as
that conveyed by an atom of hydrogen or of iodine.
I take it for granted from him that the atomic theory
offers an ultimate description of the events he has
segregated in his selected universe. But, at the same
time, I have no difficulty in agreeing with the moralist
when he says that definite rights bring definite obli-
gations, and that these obligations are capable of
expression in the form of commandments. I take
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 203
it for granted from him that the theory of a " kingdom
of ends" — of beings who are never mere means,
but possess a purposive career — offers an ultimate
description of the events he segregates in his selected
universe. Nevertheless, I notice instantly that the
truth of the one proposition lacks application utterly
in the region where the other reigns supreme. The two
judgements circle, quite apart ; yet, both belong equally
to common life, — the one holds no more truth than
the other. Essentially, then, each is true only under
partial conditions. Neither runs freely through the
entire range of experience. Moral atoms and chemical
persons cannot be even figments of the wildest im-
agination.^ The divided universe abides divided.
Now I am anxious to have you understand that a
large proportion of contemporary difficulty about
reHgious belief originates precisely from suppositions
on all fours with the absurd idea that moral atoms
and chemical persons not only exist, but are the sole
real existences. Science and religion have been
conversing in unknown tongues, with the familiar
consequence — complete, and mutual, unintelligibil-
ity. How so ? We may answer the question, first, by
reference to the preestablished discord of experience
^ Although Huxley did forget himself once so far as to think
not (cf. Works, vol. i, p. 275).
204 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
as it issues in Naturalism. For here we find a typical
case illustrating the illegitimate, if inevitable, trans-
mutation of a truth into the truth.
Men live through series of events numerous beyond
calculation, and complex beyond immediate compre-
hension. So long as the welter and involution run
riot, it is hopeless to extract explanations more sat-
isfactory than brilliant — or fooHsh — guesses. A
febrile patient betrays delirium — we suppose that
an evil spirit possesses him ; a man may not marry his
aunt — we suppose that a divine command interdicts ;
an eclipse occurs — we suppose that a dragon has
supped on the sun; a volcanic eruption overtakes a
city midmost work and play — we suppose that some
irate Titan, dwelling beyond the skies, has hinted
disapproval of the stock exchange, or of faro and
bridge. And so long as we permit events to over-
whelm us wholesale, so long we must continue to
invent myths. Accordingly, in its last analysis,
science comprises no more — and no less — than a
concentrated effort to understand a group of like
facts, by isolating them from the bewildering mob,
and thinking about them with rigid consistency. The
human intent here is to gain mastery, to dispel igno-
rance, to discover means that may lessen our terrible
impotence. Thus We see clearly why, in its very
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 205
nature, science cannot but be abstract. Experience
meets us in such doubtful guise that, unless we sepa-
rate a part from the whole and treat it, for our immedi-
ate purposes, as if it were still the whole, we are bogged
in intellectual and practical babyhood. Any science
one cares to name afnrms its particular subject-matter,
and its particular aim, in opposition primarily to the
necessary vagueness of the empirical sum-total. It
claims the right to construct its own special purview,
and stands ready to be judged by results. Candidly,
it starts from and ends with a hypothesis. If the
conditions governing the events selected for examina-
tion be so and so, then such and such consequences
may, usually do, ensue. But these conditions find
place in the chosen sphere only. A physics of faith,
an ethics of granite, are imaginary and inapplicable.
Take a familiar illustration. The astronomer
avers that the moon "must be revolving in a nearly
circular path round the earth as centre." Un-
doubtedly, this seems a most innocent and incontes-
table proposition. It recommends itself quickly to
all except the crank whose ' perception ' proves the
earth flat. Nevertheless, the slightest examination
serves to convince that the statement can mean some-
thing only if certain eliminations be permitted. In
other words, the ' universe ' where the judgement holds
206 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
true is the creation of what we may term the astro-
nomical intellect. For, on a little reflexion, we find
the sun productive of perturbations such that the
alleged path of our satellite continues but a moment
on the arc of any given circle and, immediately after-
wards, follows that of another, and so on indefinitely.
Now this sum of hypothetical positions might combine,
conceivably, to produce a waving curve circular on
the whole — "a series of curves with their concave
sides downwards." Yet, even so, the earth happens
to be speeding its impressive whirl about the sun;
accordingly, admit this second disturbance, and the
"circular on the whole" conveys no meaning what-
ever. Further, the sun acts like a giant locomotive,
pulling the solar system ''through the heavens" at
fearsome pace, relative to the positions of other stars.
Moreover, as astronomy itself has come to know well
recently, these other stars are active participants in
the sublime procession. Import all your conditions,
and you are bound to confess that you are as ignorant
of the moon's orbit about its primary as you are of all
that lies —
" Beyond the path of the utmost star through utter dark-
ness hurled."
Is the astronomer, then, a kind of amiable lunatic?
By no means — any mariner will tell you that he is a
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 207
most useful animal; for, has he not pointed out that
this very motion of the moon furnishes a master-clock,
to keep tab on the chronometers during a long voyage ?
Nor is the implied contradiction so extraordinary as
it appears. To obtain unified knowledge, the as-
tronomer has adopted a certain method of procedure,
one so well understood as to be conventional — that
is all. Perhaps, indeed, he presumed too much on
the capacity of the layman in his positive statement.
For, what he intended to say was this: if you have
two masses such as the earth and the moon, constitut-
ing a system in which the primary and the satellite
move at a mean distance of 240,000 miles; and if
their motions be not perturbed by interference, then
the path of the moon with the earth as centre will be
nearly circular. Granted, some wiseacre will argue,
but what right has the astronomer to eliminate these
known perturbations? The reply is, This is the es-
sential method of science. If, within any group of
empirical events, you fimd it possible to cancel con-
comitant phenomena, because they do not create dis-
turbance sufficient to compel an accounting, then, for
practical purposes, you may treat them as non-existent.
Otherwise, advance in knowledge would be impossible.
And, mutatis mutandis, the younger sciences follow
their venerable sister — to them she offers a type of
208 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
* exact ' work. Nay, if they could but translate their
synopses into the terms of her vast simplicity, they
would compass assurance uncloyed by hesitation.
It will not surprise us to learn, then, that no cau-
tious scientific man transgresses his self-imposed
limits. He refuses to affirm that his conclusions,
or those of his science, suffice to explain the totality
of experience. Sensible of irrevocable conditions,
lie will not commit himself to more than this : ' Permit
me to concentrate attention upon a group of similar
or identical events; permit me to discard all indi-
vidual (maybe freakish) factors within this group in-
considerable enough to disturb unitary grasp; this
agreed, I undertake to tell, nay, to foretell, what is
very likely to happen within the circle of known or
observed phenomena. Natural laws embody human
judgements; cause is an indispensable tool in man's
intellectual armoury; a hypothesis is a provisional
arrangement and, as provisional, becomes a goad to
further enquiry, to more thorough reflexion. In its
own proper function, science knows nothing about
law, or cause, or hypothesis as such, much less about
"the moral order of the universe," or about God.
Competent in variable degrees, dependent upon op-
portunity for investigation and possibility of formula-
tion, the sciences lay no claim to dictate in other fields.
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 209
They keep the peace among themselves. The sane
physiologist would not go about to advance his work
by bullying the psychologist, even although their pur-
suits intersect. In other words, a cardinal principle
of the scientific temper is non-interference, because
what holds in one sphere may prove a hindrance in
another, or, peradventure, a source of active error.
You cannot universalize a 'positive' science. The
procedure would evaporate all the characteristics
that make it worth while.'
But, if I have contrived to render the position evi-
dent, what is to be said about the touted menagerie
of quasi-scientific bogies that has toured the Western
world these last eighty years ? What of MateriaHsm,
Agnosticism, Naturalism, and so forth — the bloodless
centaurs that still harry hapless humanity ? I would
venture the guess that, possibly, they are a troop of
hallucinations bred by auto-suggestion upon self-
confidence. Recent thought has won its most superb
conquests on the broad field of positive science. In-
toxicated by success, its memory needs to be jogged
on the subject of the conditions precedent to ' progress '
in studies of this kind. For all these rampageous
'isms,' if tracked to their common lair, prove very
innocuous beasts. One of them — Materialism —
met ruthless death recently; and the others, para-
2IO MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
doxically, are more difficult and more easy to slay for
one and the same reason. More difficult, because
Materialism did possess what purported to be a body;
more easy, because in them many frantic lovers have
contrived to give —
" to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name ; "
and love offers no atmosphere to criticism. Yet the
delusions yield to rather elementary scepticism — in
fact, after all the pother, this is their disappointing
feature. We are met by another instance of popular
metaphysicizing and, as usual, of self-deception.
Experience was fated to humbug itself.
Any science, that is, any body of judgements about
a part of experience, becomes self-contradictory, if
you insist that it transform itself into a rational
account of experience as a whole. Nay, it might be
maintained that, precisely in proportion as a science
conforms to the ideal of 'exactness,' it declines in
truth when universalized, just because it is less able
to grasp, or adjust, individual cases. The more we
can eliminate from the group peculiar to a special
science, the more 'exact' the possible results; but,
conversely, the less is the science equipped to present
in detail the larger whole whence it fissured at first.
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 211
The personal escapes it; so let us be personal for a
moment. It is interesting, no doubt, to learn that
Mr. Taft weighs nigh three hundred pounds. Yet
this numerical evaluation informs us no whit on his
present meaning — it is silent upon the ' how ' of
his nomination to the Presidency of the United States.
We are glad to know, as an additional fact, that
Senator Fairbanks exceeds the average American in
height. But, thanks to the incurable vulgarity of
the press, his supposititious addiction to "butter-
milk highballs" counted far more emphatically in
his descent from the perilous levels of haute politique.
That is to say, the weight and the height are true,
with incomparable truth, in their proper places, for
they may count as paragons of the 'exact.' They
are thus true, however, at the cost of desperate
poverty, when it comes to social issues in the concrete.
The veriest yokel would bubble with mirth were one
to suggest solemnly that they told " the whole truth."
Unseemly and rude jest aside, Mr. Taft does not
connote mere girth, Mr. Fairbanks mere length.
Now, the putative fathers of Naturalism have com-
mitted themselves to just this Gilbertian fancy, and
have contrived to affiliate upon respectable science a
precious family of infant encumbrances. It were
well to remember that, within her own household,
212 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
no responsibility can be saddled on science. Natural-
ism is the latest gift of the ghostly stork, a tribute to
the generative power of the preestablished discord
immanent in frail human experience.
Strangely enough, Naturalism results primarily,
not from the analysis of physical facts, but from the
pressure of ideal demands. In a measure, the very
existence of science renders it inevitable; a supra-
scientific synthesis comes forth to crown minor
syntheses. For, scientific enquiry finds its dominant
motive in the desire to reach complete accuracy.
Self-sustained and self-witnessing unification of-
fers the sole end worth pursuit. But, just on this
account, human experience becomes a house divided
against itself. The aim thus projected under
stress of circumstances may be attained so far, yet
at a round price. Man must agree to walk the strait
road of stringent rule. He must adopt a literal
interpretation of the familiar maxim — this one
thing I do. Perforce, other things are jettisoned
ruthlessly. Accuracy after its kind may ensue, but
only at the expense of constant elimination. Thus
the scientific labourer finds his ideal incarnate in a
definite type of work, governed by equally definite
method. To these he conforms, whether he recog-
nize his course fully or not. A distinguished physiol-
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 213
ogist of my acquaintance slipped the cat from the bag
in conversation with me once. We were debating
the difhcuhies incident to various classes of research,
when he exclaimed suddenly, not without emotion,
"If only my subject were like physics, how easy it
would be to determine the facts." He implied, of
course, that, if he could simplify his material by
exclusion, many of his insoluble problems would
disappear. He failed to see, however, that the re-
mainder would not afford problems in physiology.
Given the same conditions, were this practicable,
there is no reason why the physiologist should miss
the ' exact ' as the physicist views it. And here we
have a most significant intimation. Most naturally,
the physico-chemical standard of 'exact' knowledge
appeals to workers in other fields as the ideal norm
regulating their conformity. Historically, celestial
mechanics furnished the methods of measurement in
space and computation in time that enabled science
to start upon its conquering career. Hence, too, the
negative side of the same notion. Many competent
masters in the exact sciences cannot conceive how
history or sociology — much less philosophy — have
remote title to a place in the realm of 'positive' study.
Nevertheless, they betray no consciousness of the
apposition between an ideal that motivates all
214 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
research, and the conditions that conspire at once to
satisfy and to stultify it. So, despite logic, the partial
satisfaction, lying within reach, comes to be grasped,
while the precedent, and indispensable, restrictions
to space and time, that produce stultification outside
this limited range, lapse into oblivion. Amid the
excitement of pursuit, men forget that the nature of
its starting-point forces their chase into endlessness.
The implied problem evaporates, because —
" Stultus ab obliquo qui quum descendere possit,
Pugnat in adversas ire natator aquas."
If we are to be 'exact-scientific,' as our German
friends say, what conditions frame the ideal? As
we have seen, it is out of the question to reach any
'exact' conclusion except on a basis of deliberate
simplification. For this reason, the conditions prove
comparatively simple, all things considered. They
are (i) stability or identity for human consciousness
of the objects studied; (2) ready application of
measurement and enumeration; (3) continuity of
the segregated phenomena on the whole. Granted
that all men can seize essential marks of the chosen
objects in the same way; granted that series of
observations can be averaged and stored in mathe-
matical formulas; granted that the adopted series be
THE FREEST ABLISHED DISCORD 215
continuous — that it be divisible into portions by
any one of its terms, yet without a ' real ' break, and
that, therefore, any term may be referred to another
as its precise consequent; then you obtain a flow of
inevitable sequences, and partial induction may be
lifted to the level of confident prediction. In short,
you possess a scheme which works admirably within
its range. Moreover, you are bound to admit its
competence so long as it keeps its own comer of the
garden. So far, so good. But the question arises
forthwith. What follows from the admission, or
adoption, of these self-denying ordinances necessary
to 'exact' results? The answer lies on the surface.
Let us take the requirements successively.
(i) What kind of information about any objects
do all men possess in common? Plainly they know
such characters as are dependent upon the external
senses or, otherwise, such as are capable of expression
in unequivocal symbols. Conceptions differ enor-
mously from individual to individual, but perceptions
possess a relative identity, stable enough for practical
purposes. I cannot, by any alchemy, transfer my
concrete mental, moral, and emotional states to
another; but I can illustrate some few of them by
means of symbols that hold universally for the special
senses. No unity of experience is practicable for
2l6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
a knowledge compressible into precise terms, except
the very general judgements based upon the organ-
ism of percipients. What we call spiritual life, for
example, is so acutely personal as to evade simple
transfer from man to man. Accordingly, for the
purposes of science, the unity of experience means
no more than the average identity of impressions of
sense. Hence, of course, the crude doctrine, that
experience is these impressions, and naught besides.
The real fact happens to be that we have restricted
experience ourselves, by adopting a specific attitude
towards it, for a concerted and entirely justifiable
purpose. The preestablished discord, that is, pivots
upon an attempt to extrude the ideal element, in
order to arrive at an ideal. Deny the ideal, in an
effort to universalize the partial position, and illusion
becomes the unavoidable consequence. The scien-
tific transcription is true on its own recognizances, but
misses application to the ideal process whereon this
truth depends. Sense averages are predicable of
sense averages; the effort to employ them elsewhere
occasions the worst stultifications of misunder-
standing.
(2) The call for the reduction to standards of
number and measurement flows directly from what is
known as the Law of Parsimony. Among its many
THE FREEST ABLISHED DISCORD 217
invaluable services, positive science has devised a
magnificent scheme of syncopation. Given an
'exact' result, given the means of reproducing it
unchanged, and you may adopt it fearlessly as the
sure basis for further work. You inherit the harvest
of the ages for your use. Now, we cannot store our
imaginations, loves, sorrows, in this fashion. Hence
their intense strain upon temperament. But we can
minimize intellectual labour, by employing the tri-
umphs of our predecessors, in relation to events
capable of retention by terms of number and magni-
tude. Omit the specifically human, treat those of
'our' events in which we stand on a level with the
rest of the cosmos and become accidents of it, as
if they alone spoke our secret, and you can formulate
per X and y with thoroughgoing success. Still,
remember all the while that you can so proceed only
with regard to "many-one relations of all times to
some places, or of all terms of a continuous one-
dimensional series / to some terms of a continuous
three-dimensional series 5." ^ Here, once again, an
ideal has dictated the means to its own realization;
these means, as applied irrationally to all experience
by Naturalism, expel the ideal reference. And so,
^ The Principles of Mathematics, Bertrand Russell, vol. i,
P- 473-
2l8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
when one tries to universalize them, the illusion
prevails that the ideally arranged conditions furnish
irrefragable proof of the non-existence of the ideal.
(3) The demands just noticed concern the nature
of experience itself. The third bears another refer-
ence. It asks that the object of knowledge assume
a nature of its own — that it must he continuous.
In the present connexion, I cannot diverge to pur-
sue the necessary analysis, for it leads straight to
the difficult and, frankly, ill-understood, problem of
causality. One would suppose that, at this late date,
Hume had contrived to clear men's minds of cant
about cause; unfortunately it is not so. Notwith-
standing, it is clear that, unless a series of phenomena
be continuous, the connexion of one event (as effect)
with another (as cause) transcends possibility.
Causes and effects, as such, are bound to rank as
occurrences in a single, seamless process. Apart
from this texture, 'exact' science would prove the
merest dream. Now, the 'fact' owes its existence,
not to a universal series, but to a special series sys-
tematized ideally in a certain way. A logical prin-
ciple of synthetic unity betrays its presence in causal-
ity — or there are neither causes nor effects. Thus,
to obtain our results of precision, we posit an ideal
truth; and then, in our naive Naturalism, proceed
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 219
to deny the ideal on the basis of its own consequences.
I know this is not philosophy, I should be "black
ashamed" were I compelled to suppose it science.
On the whole, then, and from the nature of the
case, Naturalism offers but another example of the
preestablished discord that overtakes men whenever
they try to explain their 'universe' by reference even
to their best knowledge of a small part thereof.
Further, it happens to be no conclusion from any, or
from all, science. Fundamentally, it is a meta-
physical speculation invented to account for the
presence of the ideal eliminations under which
science originates and must proceed. Huxley's
brilliant analogy of the garden which, though a
"result of the cosmic process, working through and
by human energy, the influences of the state of nature
are constantly tending to destroy," ^ offers an ad-
mirable illustration of the inner contradiction that
drives humanity to seek rest, not in a lesser whole
universalized illegitimately, but in the broad sweep
of a larger life. Yet the pure intellect fails to absorb
the lesson ere it has ventured upon the universalizing
process, oblivious of the initial restrictions that made
its practical use successful. But when, overcome
by the deep and inevitable contradictions that arise,
^ Cf. Evolution and Ethics: Collected Works, vol. ix, pp. 9 f.
220 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
it proceeds, as it did at last in Huxley's person and
swan-song, to try again in an ethical realm, it simply
obeys the necessary logic born of its analytic devices,
which accomplish results by open neglect of re-
mainders. For Naturalism "begins with real bodies
in empty space, and ends with ideal motions in an
imperceptible plenum. It begins with the dynamics
of ordinary masses, and ends with a medium that
needs no dynamics or has dynamics of its own. But
between beginning and end, there are stages innumer-
able; in other words, the end is an unattainable
ideal." ^ A tale that is told. Naturalism may be
dismissed with a tale. A Scot, given to the vices of
his folk, informed his minister that he intended to
travel in Bible lands. "When I climb tae the top of
Mt. Sinai," he added, " I'm gaen for tae read the Ten
Commandments." The wise and witty parson re-
plied, "Man, Sandy, ye'd faur better bide at hame
and keep them." If the representatives of the posi-
tive sciences would stick to their last, — and, re-
mark, the best usually do, — advance would not be
stayed, to say the least; and we should not have to
encounter delays due to bewildering fogs of bad
metaphysics. As Professor Mach has pointed out,
^ Naturalism and Agnosticism, James Ward, vol. i, p. 153
(ist ed.).
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 221
"the highest philosophy of the scientific investigator
is precisely toleration for an incomplete conception of
the world and the preference for it, rather than an
apparently perfect but inadequate conception." ^
But, worse luck, man is not built this way. He
must criticise his scientific categories; and he finds
frequent vent for his need in the supposition that
their transfer to a suprascientific field constitutes
criticism. Nay, he spurns deliverance from this
body of death. Naturalism, the executioner of the
ideal life, remains a standing witness to this very life
— only it stands on its head. Its easy psychology,
beatified in epiphenomenalism, fails to transcribe
the concrete facts of the psychical process, and dis-
plays laughable contentment with a conspectus of
parts riven from the whole. Still, it were worse
than useless to complain. For, once again, we
are —
"Striking the electric chain wherewith we are darkly bound."
In conclusion, we pass to the decisions of the his-
torico-critical method. At the close of a lecture, it is
far from my intention to canvass one of the most
difficult problems now before the human mind — the
ultimate import of history, and the consequent re-
^ The Science of Mechanics, p. 464 (2d Eng. ed.).
222 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
lation of precise historical knowledge to the validity
of religious belief/ For the question necessitates a
profound critical excursus into the legitimate mean-
ings of the terms 'Time' and 'Eternity.' Besides,
philosophy herself stands but on the threshold of
this baffling subject. However, I must try to ex-
hibit the movement of the preestablished discord
within the historical range. It infects the stand-
point of history, when universalized, no less than
the popular metaphysics of science. When the rude
facts concerning Jesus, as adjusted with cool accu-
racy by historical method, are taken, and when the
'historical' allegations as formulated in the Apos-
tles' Creed, say, are placed in juxtaposition, but one
inference can follow. It is this. Christians of the
traditional type seem to have been fated to make
tarts from Dead Sea fruit. What was, as the actual
record runs, is neither what they are required to
believe, nor what many of them desire it to have been.
Cook the ingredients as you will, the brew smacks of
anticlimax. Mutat quadratarotundis, as Horace said.
As an evident consequence, we encounter the pre-
established discord in another of its ubiquitous
^ I may be permitted to refer to my paper, Historic Fact and
Christian Validity, read in part at the Detroit meeting of the
American Church Congress, May 14, 1908, and printed in full
in the Proceedings.
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 223
phases, one distressing beyond measure to all faith-
ful souls. It were well worth while, accordingly, to
pursue it, if only a short way.
What is the consensus of opinion about history
among experts, whose competence guarantees their
right to testify? The reply admits of no doubt.
History is, first and foremost, a series in time. As
such, it presents two characteristics, so essential
that, apart from them, it would become a vapid
phantasmagoria. It is single, and irreversible. In
other words, it must conform to the demand for
continuity, just like the material of physical science,
and its terms must interlock in some form of causal
relation. Given these conditions, and history falls
within the circle of practicable research; withdraw
them, and the science goes to pieces. That is,
history betrays determination after its kind and,
within the sweep of the determination, the parts
played by single events or individuals may be re-
duced to the level of accidents. They hold no sort
of virtue in their own right, as it were, because their
hammered concatenation in the sequence alone be-
stows significance. The ''fatalism of facts," fore-
seen long ago by Quinet, rules now, a conditio sine
qud non. As we saw in the case of science, so in
that of history, it were worse than useless to vent
224 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
complaint. For the complainants inhabit outer
darkness, as concerns ability to sit in judgement.
We might just as well carp at the physicist, and
refuse to have water led into our houses, because
water does not rise to its own level, as dismiss
the historian, learned in the 'causes' of the Boston
Tea Party. In practice, we agree with both. Why ?
Because both can plead the same justification
for the conditions necessary to their craft; with-
out the antecedent standpoint, neither science nor
history could exist to serve mankind. Remove
continuity and cause, you shatter the very possi-
bility of history. Vague generalities, a priori ab-
stractions, idealistic formulas, never give body to
history; on the contrary, they cloud the factual
issues. Take Augustine's delicate fancy: ''Deus
. . . ita ordinem saeculorum tanquam pulcherrimum
carmen etiam ex quibusdam quasi antithetis hones-
taret;" ^ it may rank as excellent poetic license —
about real history it tells less than nothing. A series
of causal filiations never moves even remotely like
rhetorical 'contraposition,' as Quintilian called it.
Along with all other objects amenable to a single
systematic order, historical units happen under the
strait limits of space and time. To write history is
^ De Civ. Dei, xi, i8.
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 225
to uncover the causal filaments, by inexhaustible
diligence in amassing the incidental occurrences,
by impartial judgement of evidence and, on this
basis, to elicit 'explanation' of the facts from the
correlations traceable within their own process.
The death of this man, therefore, ranks on a level
with the death of that. Find the relevant circum-
stances, follow the phenomenal interplay and,
irreversible sequence given, events will be found
to explain themselves on the same general lines.
Nothing remains to be added. Anything else
would transcend the canons of history, ipso facto,
history would cease. Within this purview, on the
face of it, no demise of an individual can acquire
exceptional meaning for religion. And, as for posi-
tive science, so for history, we are bound to accept
its own account of itself without reserve. Encased
in crass ignorance of every method and canon of
judgement used, the average man dare not do less.
His practice shows his sense; he takes his history,
as he takes his train — on its own terms.
Nevertheless, time out of mind, organized Chris-
tianity has insisted that a tiny morsel of history,
minute in time, circumscribed in space, be wrenched
from the vast series and exempted from normal
conditions. Splendide audax, as only the oblivious
Q
226 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
can be, the official Christian bases his hope of sal-
vation upon some few obscure happenings, of which
we know almost nothing, in an obscure corner of
the ]\iediterranean world, of which we know little.
He alleges that they were historical occurrences,
abnormal to infinity. And yet, as ' exact' history sees
these things, less than no evidence exists to raise them
from the rank and file marching in causal sequence.
Moreover, the adherents of other ethnic religions
have set, and followed, the same example. The
historical attitude to Buddhism and Mahommedan-
ism stands on all fours with its ultimatum to Chris-
tianity. Could the preestablished discord go far-
ther, or make us fare worse? I think not. For,
consider the tremendous character of the apposi-
tion. Historically, Jesus was a man, born like
other Jews, circumstanced as his neighbours; a
disturber of civil peace — tried, condemned, and
executed like other undesirables; then a corpse,
entombed, and returned to dust like other corpses.
Yet, for Christianity, despite the prosaic noncha-
lance of historical facts, " God so loved the world,
that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever
believeth in him should not perish, but have ever-
lasting life"; and, "If Christ be not risen from the
dead, then your faith is in vain." Again, I ask.
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 227
could discord go farther ? * Evidently, the events
as possible within any causal time-series, and the
affirmations of belief, move on two totally different
planes. Notwithstanding, Christians have been for-
ward to urge that their religion finds its sole sure
basis within the time-series where, historically, it
cannot belong, by any admission open to contempo-
rary knowledge. Further, the Christian allegation
is not susceptible of proof by objective evidence,
nay, the evidence now recoverable has been turned
against it with terrible effect. The appeal to his-
tory, once taken so confidently, has declined to the
dismal level of a cry ad misericordiam — ' for any
sake, and in the name of anything you hold holy,
allow the probability or, at least, the possibility, of
our plea' ! Verily, a situation profoundly pathetic !
It needs no keen perspicacity to see that here, as
with the scientific consciousness, the preestablished
discord has eventuated in an impassable chasm.
As the conditions precedent to * exact ' science baulk
the satisfaction of desire to rationalize the universe,
so the standpoint inseparable from causal history
vetoes the longing of religion to detect a special
^ It is hardly necessary to point out that this discord underlies
the problem of Christology in its classical forms (cf. my article
Christology, in Baldwin's Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology).
228 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
revelation in some events incident to the hazy past.
But the cases are not parallel entirely. Driven by
the innate human demand for an explanation of all
things, the scientific consciousness attempts self-
satisfaction by spinning a theory out of enumerations
in time and measurements in space — limitations
inapplicable to any consciously presented kosmos
whatsoever. As a result, men are condemned to
labour in a quarry for fallacies. Driven by the
human demand for a definite guarantee of the com-
pletion which religion seeks, the Christian attempts
self-satisfaction by transfiguring a fragment torn
from the temporal series of history, where religion,
as contact with the eternal, cannot abide. As a
result, men find themselves abandoned, defenceless,
to the panoplied assault of rationalism. The same
effort of human nature, to achieve an inclusive ex-
perience, results in the same discord, though by dif-
ferent processes.
Thus, the preliminary stage of our constructive en-
quiry appears to end in a stalemate. Yet we have
gained something. In the first place, and nega-
tively, we have found that a mechanical phenome-
nalism, confined to quantitative forms in space and
time, cannot furnish means to formulate an expla-
nation of experience on the whole. It omits the
THE FREEST ABLISHED DISCORD 229
very things most in need of explanation, and without
this omission could not proceed with its own work.
Beyond its chosen range it is helpless, because
quite impracticable, when individual variations call
for an accounting. In the second place, and still
negatively, we have found that Christian phenome-
nalism, which would set the fundamental truths of
religion in an irreversible time-series, is helpless to
discover them there, without destruction of the
entire posited series. In the third place, and posi-
tively, we have found that both movements issue
from an inalienable need of our nature, and that,
forced by its clamour to these issues, men become
entangled in insoluble contradictions. Nothing else
could come of essays either to make the conceptions
of 'exact' science include the entire content of
experience, or the sources of historical knowledge —
knowledge about a religion — the principal and
normative content of religion itself. Accordingly,
we have travelled so far as to be able to rid ourselves
of a self-stultifying Naturalism, which cannot pro-
ceed from an abstract universe, 'outside' conscious-
ness supposedly, to the universal in consciousness.
But we have not succeeded in ridding ourselves of
self-contradictory religious supernaturalism, which
cannot proceed from a timeless universe to an event
230 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
at once in time and unmediated by time. We have
been able to see also that the root of error is the same
in both cases — the imperative call of human expe-
rience for self-satisfaction, baulked, however, by
unawareness of the precedent conditions. By its
very nature, no mathematical computation can com-
pass the ethico-religious consciousness. By its very
nature, no unit incidental to an irreversible order
can pose as quod semper ^ quod ubique, et quod ah
omnibus. Specific historical events command cre-
dence only on specific historical evidence; and per-
sonal religion has no measure in common with such
events. We must insist over and over again that
the religious object cannot be prisoned within the
integument of historical science. Yet Christians
have cherished the supposition that they would
find it here more completely than elsewhere. The
consequent puzzle pays but another tribute to the
immanent process that governs the preestablished
discord.
We are driven, therefore, to "try the great ocean"
of the ethico-religious consciousness itself. Mayhap
we shall fare better; for, if no more, at least man
has illustrated the activities most characteristic of
his peculiar being on this limitless area. Perhaps,
we shall discover reason to conclude that, while all
THE PREESTABLISHED DISCORD 23 1
that is temporal exists, not all that exists is temporal.
If so, we ought to be in a position to transcend
'exact' history. Perhaps, we may come to under-
stand that the future, rather than the past, sets the
norms of the religious career. If so, we might be
able to regard causal reference in time, not as a
negligible quantity, indeed, but as a subordinate
function.
LECTURE VI
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING
Any one who has tried to reach consistent ideas
on the thorny subject, would agree readily that the
ethical consciousness presents grievous difficulties.
Its elusive movement seems to mock with subtler
irony, the more faithfully one follows. And, if this
be true for the careful student, who aims at a uni-
tary construction, it strikes home, no less sharply,
to the ordinary observer, or actor, in common life.
Customary affairs of conduct produce numerous
dilemmas from hour to hour. How often the de-
cent citizen finds himself in a strait between two,
and asks, Who will show me the good? Baffled
thus on both sides, which together exhaust the field,
small wonder that we should hesitate when com-
pelled to seek a point of departure for our enquiry.
Moral situations afford few decisive hints, thanks
to their differentiated multiplicity; moral philoso-
phies turn out so various, and so personal, as to
furnish no foothold satisfactory to all. By good
232
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 233
luck, however, especially in the present connexion,
religion itself has been prone to display an unmis-
takable attitude towards the relative value of the
moral life. Moreover, whether we select religious
theory, as illustrated in theology, or religious prac-
tice, as followed by the Church, this disposition
makes itself felt, with significant consequences.
Here, at all events, our feet touch solid ground.
Accordingly, I invite you to approach the ethical
consciousness by way of two questions, put into our
lips by religion, not least by Christianity. In the
first place. Why have the ethnic religions tended
more or less strongly — but tended quite plainly on
the whole — to relegate moral conduct to a plane
of secondary importance? No doubt, none of
them dismiss it as if it were negligible; often they
stress, even strain, it — we have all heard of "the
Law," and of Christian Ethics. Nevertheless, it
hardly ranks with ''the one thing needful." In the
second place. Why has the Church met such move-
ments as 'Ethical Culture' with active hostility,
or with impatience, or with almost open contempt?
Or, coming down to date. Why do so many reli-
gious folk shake their heads troublously over that
recent development baptized, by a delightful pleo-
nasm, the "institutional church"? Were all these
234 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
modern phenomena merely fresh eddies on the
broken surface of our evanescent day, they might
signify little. But it seems unquestionable that,
after religion has attained a certain stage of self-
consciousness, has grown aware clearly of its dis-
tinctive nature, this attitude settles into a perma-
nent characteristic. Nay, evidence could be led
for the thesis that, in proportion as religion realizes
itself adequately, the subordination of the ethical
standpoint receives emphasis. Pray note, I am
not raising the problem of the ultimate relation
between religion and morality. I am only drawing
attention to the patent fact, that, in its large sweep,
religion tends to regard moral conduct as of inferior
importance to something else — what, we need not
enquire just now; and that, as religion reaches
completer expression in degree, this inclination
appears to become a regulative factor in its explicit
outlook. Sharpened by these pregnant hints, we
may start — fairly enough, I think — with the
question. What justification, if any, has religion for
such procedure? Obviously, all things considered,
the situation warrants not a little curiosity. For,
why should religion behave superciliously to morals ?
At the outset, it must be understood distinctly
that religion does not censure the moral life, but
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 235
rather denies its authoritative validity within some
regions. Kinship is admitted; and it were ad-
visable to dwell on this aspect of the case for a
moment. Family jars often go deepest, intimate
most. A doctrine, by no means extinct to-day,
teaches that, while morality may defy explanation,
we can reduce it by explaining it away. That is,
one can run it back to physical and physiological
causes; this done, its peculiar importance disap-
pears with its independence. Summarily, it pos-
sesses less reality than other parts of experience,
because a derivant, not an original, self-witnessing
activity. Recall, then, that even the dubious
attitude of religion, now under consideration, never
supports this topsy-turvy notion. Rightly so. For
it requires no argument to confirm the self-evident
proposition, that one portion of experience is no
more, and no less, real than another. A man's
moral career constitutes a fact to be reckoned with
just as much as his chemical or historical knowledge.
Chemists and historians must encounter problems
of conduct like their fellow-men. All eiEfective
components of experience, surely, are effective
components. To enquire which are more real is to
put a nonsensical query — one that corresponds to
nothing of importance for an experient. Religion
236 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
has never committed itself to absurdities of this sort
in its commerce with morahty. In our complex
existence, the reality of moral issues and their
dilemmas counts equally with that of intellectual
theories and their demands. Both occur, and here
the matter ends, as concerns institution of odious
comparisons. Accordingly, we infer that religion
has not minimized morality, because it may be a
by-product of superabundant bile or of superior
pancreatic juice, but for a far different reason.
Nor is this all by any means. Another, and
more weighty consideration claims attention. As
we have seen, 'exact' science and 'causal' history
prefer specific conditions, which must regulate
their material, if scientific and historical results are
to accrue. If you recall them, as summarized in the
last Lecture, you will observe at once that none
apply within the religious life. For example,
religion submits to no enumeration in time, or
measurement in space; and it eludes retention in
mathematical formulas. Similarly, it never mani-
fests itself in a continuous, but always in a discon-
tinuous, series. It were a work of supererogation
to take the dimensions of faith in cubic centimetres,
or to calculate the efficacy of prayer by the parallelo-
gram of forces. Now, the moral life stands twin
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 237
to religion here. Just as the parallelogram of
forces may be employed with equal facility in
astronomy and physics, so other standards of
judgement —
"How sad and bad and mad it was —
But then, how it was sweet ! " —
apply readily in the ethical and religious spheres
alike. So, if nature be an elliptical name for one
kind of order, conduct and belief proclaim another.
The conventional phrase, ' physical science,' carries
unequivocal signification. For the unprejudiced
student of human experience in all its aspects, the
phrase teleological science ought to be no whit less
clear. Any investigation of moral and religious
phenomena is teleological. The material under
scrutiny compels this description.
But the term ^teleology,' like others of its kind,
has descended to us encompassed with naive associa-
tions. We must reckon with contemporary usage,
in the same way as we no longer attach the Greek
sense to 'nature.' Therefore, to avoid miscon-
ception, especially on the part of our naturalistic
friends, who accord curious, if telltale, importance
to Paley, we shall try to explain it. When one calls
ethical and religious events teleological, one proceeds
in the same way as the scientific man when he classes
238 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
physiology, histology, or cytology under the concept
* biological ' — neither more nor less. The impli-
cation is this: They come full of material charac-
terized throughout by fundamental differentiating
qualities. No objection lies against the one word;
similarly, no objection ought to lie against the
other. Yet, misfortunately, teleology was "bom
out of time," and preempted. It used to signify
purpose injected from without, especially from above.
A superhuman agent had insinuated a plan into the
eye, say, just as the optician had constructed the
telescope with a purpose in view. It were super-
fluous to record that, in the present state of know-
ledge, no circumspect thinker hints such reference,
any more than he posits vitalism in the term ' biol-
ogy.' He means simply that the group of phe-
nomena evinces certain qualities by its very existence,
and that, without them, it would not conform to
its known nature. Further, a teleological event need
not be less amenable to explanation by self-reference
than a mechanical one. Indeed, from the stand-
point of any enquiry within human competence,
they occupy the same level in this respect. Man
may search most various topics, he must state them
all in terms of the human equation.
As the issue bears directly upon our whole subject,
4
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 239
we stop to ask, What emerges from it ? In the first
place, as noted in the last Lecture, the linkage be-
tween the members of a mechanical series is invariable
and identical, no matter what differences separate
terms may disclose on the surface. We are aware
that the vibrations of a tense string, and the dis-
charges from a Leyden jar, propagate themselves
in the same way. We are able even to devise
experiments such that the proof receives ocular
demonstration — nodes and antinodes can be seen
in both cases. And we are sure that the same
regular disturbances happen in an organ pipe.
In ethics and religion this stable identity fails.
"Outside should suffice for evidence:
And whoso desires to penetrate
Deeper, must dive by the spirit-sense —
No optics like yours, at any rate ! "
A unique activity, one incapable of prediction, dis-
closes itself and, thereafter, the series undergoes
transformation, thanks to its presence. The ref-
erence runs forward, not backwards. In other
words, we meet a situation such that causal de-
pendence must be abandoned, if we would reckon
with the manifest facts. Apply causality, if you
will, but remember that, whatever its convenience,
you have committed yourself to the tender mercies
240 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of a misleading analogy. Take, for example, the
process known as conversion, whether moral or
religious. A man has passed years in solid con-
tentment with the conventional standards of his
profession, class, or nationality. At length he
"comes to see things in a different light." His
scale of basal values vanishes — rank, wealth, in-
fluence, what not, ''appeal to him" no longer.
He has become a devotee to scientific research,
mayhap. His old friends cease to comprehend
him, he behaves so queerly. In such a case, we
have the outbiesik — never wbreak — of the new
acti\dty typical of the teleological, and therefore
discontinuous, series. No design by anticipation,
special to just this end, is implied necessarily even
from within; much less has aught been injected
for the specific purpose from an external, super-
natural source. But we do find a revolutionary
qualitative difference — the very thing abhorrent
to 'exact' science and 'causal' history. Were
they to embrace these phenomena, they would com-
mit suicide. Nevertheless, an angle of intellectual
vision enjoys no patent to remove or obliterate
facts. Adopt what standpoint you please, these
affairs happen to be effective components of human
experience. Put in cold words, pale shades of the
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 241
process in concrete, this ''is a hard saying." Yet
it embodies a group of normal events in the career
of every man who has sojourned in the valley of
veritable moral or religious trial. "Verily, verily,
I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he
cannot see the kingdom of God. . . . Marvel
not that I said unto thee. Ye must be born again.
The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest
the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it Com-
eth, and whither it goeth : so is every one that is
born of the Spirit." ^ These verses record the
whole story in familiar language.
It remains to emphasize the fact that such incidents
designate themselves no less distinctly than space
and time variables. They possess their peculiar
modes of existence and preservation. If the con-
tinuous series be a quantitative sequence, the
discontinuous exhibits a self-consistent unity, domi-
nated by a forth-reaching ideal. And this ideal
announces the free dictation of the end that renders
the compacted events teleological.
*'How inexhaustibly the spirit grows!
One object, she seemed erewhile born to reach
With her whole energies and die content, —
So like a wall at the world's edge it stood,
^ John iii. 3, 7, 8.
242 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
With nought beyond to live for, — is that reached ? —
Already are new undream'd energies
Outgrowing under, and extending farther
To a new object ; — there's another world ! "
We are confronted here by the concerted surprises
of a self-developing system, never by uniformities
of external adjustment, traceable to the nexus of
adjacent agencies. That is, we have a type of
individuality maintained throughout a qualitative
series. Apply mechanical judgements, if you like;
they disclose nothing but paradox. You may ab-
stract from the qualities, if you so choose, — to
obtain 'causal' history, for instance. But you must
bear in mind that you have chosen to eliminate, and
that elimination produces no change in the original
factual totality. You are not studying the given
group in its proper reality; you are dealing with it
for a purpose of your own, foreign to the data;
you are not essaying an explanation of the case
as presented. Accordingly, we seem entitled to
conclude that, if we are to penetrate human history,
to pierce beyond its outer framework to its actual
process, we must class its phenomena with those
of ethics and religion. At best, 'causal' history,
the bootless search for origins that disturbs pious
souls, cannot amount to more than a preparation —
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 243
a necessary one, surely — for appreciation of the
spiritual temperament in its concrete entirety. For
the historical series, as human, cannot be less dis-
continuous than that of ethics or religion. To state
the naked case, cause functions subordinately in
history, for there we must deal with a succession of
events, so constituted empirically, that the modi-
fications are historical only because motivated by
fresh outbreaks of ideal activity. The occurrences
that carry history belong invariably with conversion,
and not with a lever, a spool, an arch, much less with
the precession of the equinoxes. If you so desire,
you may think of them as an ethical interplay;
assuredly you can never dub them a mechanical
arrangement, except by deliberate suppression of the
very facts you have undertaken to grasp. No doubt,
one may dismiss factors for a preliminary purpose.
But persistence in this partiality reduces its spon-
sor himself to the level of a preliminary phase. He
serves himself a hewer of wood and drawer of water
for the constructive genius whose insight aspires
and joys, bleeds and burns with the palpitating
past, regenerated into the present.
Lastly, one other point of agreement between
religion and morality may be mentioned in passing.
The practical reference predominates strongly in
244 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
both. They keep with the daily round of ordinary
Hfe, rather than with abstract theories about Ufe or
the physical universe. Man lives them out.
Our analysis, then, reveals a substantial basis of
unity between morality and religion. This renders
the 'superior person' attitude of religion the more
surprising — and interesting. So we revert to our
former question. Has religion any justification? I
think we cannot avoid an afi&rmative answer, and for
a reason that roots in profound truth. Moral en-
deavour ends ever with the adjournment of well-
being. Thus, the position where we find ourselves
now may be described as follows. Competent and
successful within their respective ranges, quantitative
science and positive history furnish no guidance when
an account of the universalizing quality peculiar
to human nature stands in need. The tendencies of
contemporary culture prove that, when baulked in
this way, men turn to the moral life, only to find,
on the suggestion of religion, that it, too, suffers limi-
tation. Perhaps it offers another example of the pre-
established discord, though of a new and disconcert-
ing kind. Possibly Bums, that master among those
who search the heart, was right when he wrote, —
Misled by fancy's meteor-ray,
By passion driven;
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 245
But yet the light that led astray
Was light from heaven."
Evidently, we must ask, How far is this true, and
what message, if any, does it bear about reUgion
itself?
Although it may be theorized, the moral life is
practical in the first instance. It manifests itself in
overt action, the deeds of individuals. These, again,
issue from highly complex antecedents, whose nature
we indicate by calling them ' ethical.' This, in turn,
carries a social reference. Nothing counts as ethical
unless it involve an ethos — the internal spirit gener-
ated by, and peculiar to, an intensive group. Sup-
pose we take an American citizen, and proceed to
strip him of his ethical possessions. Deprive him
of all that he absorbed from his immediate family;
of the influences that flowed in upon him from the
environment of his boyhood and youth — north,
south, east, or west; of all that he derived from his
training in the common schools, and other educa-
tional institutions ; of the precepts imposed upon him
by, say, the protestantism of the sects that permeated
his neighbourhood; of the associations formed mid-
most the political and economic outlook of the
United States; of the judgements he learned un-
consciously from his daily reading in newspapers and
246 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
popular magazines; of the perspective gained from
the social ideas shared by him with his countrymen;
of the movements special to the climate of opinion
at the dawn of the twentieth century. Next, having
subtracted all these, ask. What is left? The reply
comes, swift and decisive. We not only do not know,
but have no means of knowing. Apart from these
reticular, excessively subtle, dispositions, nothing
can be said of the man, or of any man. In other
words, a mere naked individual never existed;
and the more complex the civilization wherein a
human being has partaken, the more profound this
truth. The moral life persists only as at once the
expression and the agent of transmission of such
psychological unities. It might be described as a
process of oscillation between a society and its
members. Moreover, the personal career displays
significance, gains enlargement, becomes valuable
within the group, just in proportion as the uni-
versal spirit overflows it. A man has morality, be-
cause possessed by it in everything that lends him
importance. "Hence," as Hegel wrote, *'the wisest
men of old" — by whom he meant Plato and Aris-
totle, our chief ethical authorities still — " have ad-
judged that wisdom and virtue consist in living in
conformity with the ethos of one's folk." Culture-
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 247
history enforces this truth overwhelmingly. The
paragons down the ages have been precisely those
who lost themselves in their dominant social norms,
or who attempted to emphasize relations slurred by
the contemporary spirit. The conformists, acting
with, the reformers, reacting upon, an organized
ethical unity, together constitute the elect represent-
atives of morality. Nor is the reason far to seek.
In such circumstances, external rule gives place to
inner principle. Thus inspired, the real types of the
society illustrate moral activity in its most favourable
light. For judgement can reach sharp decision in
particular difficulties. Nay, the more important
the choice, the less the hesitation to be encountered.
Almost instantly, prompted by his cultural ethos, the
* well-bred' person knows what to do. The 'ought'
shines clear, and passes to 'is' forthwith. So,
without the genial support of a diffused consciousness
of kind, morality has usually withered or wavered.
An epoch of transition and an era of simplicity,
marked by 'originals,' seem equally unfavourable to
ethical achievement. In the one, the social ideal is
at odds with itself; in the other, individuals, free
from direction, are apt to lapse into curiosities.
The unity loses its balance in duality, or pluralism.
"Social life is to personality what language is to
248 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
thought." When it is said that a nation is merely
an aggregate of individuals, "the fallacy lies in the
implication that the individuals could be what they
are, could have their moral and spiritual qualities
independently of their existence as a nation." ^
Now, the inference, consequent upon these evident
facts, offers a very relevant reason for the distaste
of religion to the adoption of ' works ' as an ultimate
test of worth. Let us put it in this way. Granted
that the ethical problem can find solution only in
practice, and granted that a social ethos gives the
environment necessary to this practice, what follows ?
First, something favourable to the ethical claim.
The antithesis between egoistic ideal and altruistic
realization tends to abate its acuteness — achieve-
ment treads the heels of aspiration most closely —
in the recompenses obtained from voluntary unity
with the great aims of one's racial or national spirit.
When the Roman stiffened his backbone and said,
"Civis Romanus sum," he was the embodiment of
what, in all fairness, we may call moral attainment.
So is your modern American or Englishman or
German, — he who feels he must be reckoned with
on account of his people, and realizes his own
responsibility in measure. When personal desire
^ Prolegomena to Ethics, T. H. Green, p. 193; ist ed.
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 249
finds itself completed in the best that bore it, then,
and then alone, possibly, something in the nature
of a moral heaven has been reached. For the
solitary soul stands transfigured, and, having united
with the many at the benign moment, serves itself
'great' ethically. In their songs, when breath
comes short, and tears start, men apostrophize no
physical land, but a spiritual state. "My Country,
'tis of Thee," "Die Wacht am Rhein," and the rest,
reek with pride, but not pride that goes before a fall ;
far rather, the pride that ensues upon real elevation.
Detach the good from materialized associations,
and you may say fervently, "Ubi bene, ibi patria."
Here, if anywhere, " eternity is in love with the pro-
ductions of time." Here, if anywhere, the incal-
culable power, and the bewitching graciousness of
the ethical appeal abash us into silence of consent
by their glorious success. Here, if anywhere, we
must find justification for the recurrent choice of
goodness as the ultimate measure of a man. Glanc-
ing back at her work, morahty might adopt, and
flaunt, the Christian motto, "Die to live." For the
genuine uplift of a folk has never been sought
vainly in the ensamples of its own soul set before it by
its sainted representatives. The revelation of the
animating principle of a communal ideal, its concrete
250 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
embodiment in a devoted, but sane, character, were,
surely, something whereon anyone could dare take
his stand "at that great day," expectant of the good
servant's reward. Self has forgotten self and,
through this very loss, has grown into the image of
a near infinity.
"The grosser parts fly off and leave the whole,
As the dust leaves the disembodied soul ! "
Accordingly, we think of our 'heroes' and 'represent-
ative men,' —
"The dead, but sceptred sovereigns, who still rule
Our spirits from their urns,"
as if they belonged to a region where Time, with her
waters of Lethe, exerts no spell. Thus, the claim
of the moral consciousness to erect a court of final
judgement has always received popular suffrage,
offered frequently a convenient, and even salutary,
recourse. But, notwithstanding its splendid title to
human allegiance, and the stimulating intensity of
its attractions, the preestablished discord haunts it.
Put it to the question, and you will discover that its
last word cannot but be the adjournment of well-
being. Of a truth, it transports one to " an exceed-
ing high mountain," but only to point the higher,
inaccessible, peak in the blue beyond.
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 2$ I
For, second, its most adequate solutions, even at
their radiant best, must keep the level of stages in
the course of culture. While no prayer may be
uplifted with more assurance, while none may be
more thoroughly worth benison, than ''the work of
our hands, establish Thou it," still the truth remains
that the work is a work, and the establishment pos-
sible only under certain limited conditions. "They
shall perish, but thou shalt endure ; yea, all of them
shall wax old like a garment ; as a vesture thou shalt
change them, and they shall be changed." * So
religion maintains. And why ? Look at our Ameri-
can civilization, for example. To the ethos of Greece
we owe the humane element — overlaid sadly —
in our free spirit; to the ethos of Palestine, trans-
mitted through Reformation Germany and Puritan
England, our religious quality ; to the ethos of Rome,
reborn in the genius of Britain, our common law;
and other factors to I know not what forces of insti-
tutionalism, consecrated in alien climes, and older
epochs. Nevertheless, we contemn Greek and Latin
for 'dead' languages, and grin over our 'progress'
when we banish them from our schools ; we exclude
the Bible, and prink ourselves in ' unsectarianism ' ;
we shiver at the very name of Roman imperialism,
^ Psalms cii. 26.
252 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
especially if we are of those whom the breezes of the
North Atlantic chill ; we flout the 'effete' civilization
of England, particularly as incarnate in its governing
class wherein, most characteristically for the modern
world, the perfection of balance between individual
aspiration and social achievement — the completest
solution of the unlaid ethical problem — is to be seen.
And for what reason, please you? Is it the most
grotesque of provincial follies, or an unamiable foible
of sheer ignorance? Not at all. The answer is.
Because we cannot help ourselves — the morality
of no one of these stages satisfies us} The root of
our superciliousness strikes deep in our own hearts.
From the height of our civilization — which is a
height only as it is ours — we look down with pity
upon all these, just as they severally scorned 'bar-
barian,' 'heathen,' or 'outsider' in their flowering
time. "Thou art weighed in the balances, and art
found wanting." This writing on the wall demands
no astrologer, Chaldaean, or soothsayer "to make
known the interpretation thereof," much less "the
excellent wisdom" of a Daniel come to judgement.
The conclusion runs plain. Universalize any solu-
tion morality can offer, and it becomes false forthwith,
self-contradictory, or even a cumberer of the ground.
* Cf. Joshua xxiii. 4-13.
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 253
"The spacious days of great Elizabeth" could not
have been spacious had they stood quod semper, quod
ubique, et quod ah omnibus. The moral life may
indeed win to a goal once in a day. No matter.
For, by its inmost constitution, it effects so much in
that day, and in that day alone. The very perfec-
tion of the unity between ideal and aspiration serves
but to originate a fresh opposition between the part
that is and the all that ought to be. The English
gentleman — Lord Cromer will pardon my imperti-
nence in citing his representative record of tenacious
rectitude — may very well be one of the finest ex-
amples of ethical completion the world has known.
Yet, callow though it may seem, we mock him, be-
cause his 'ought' either fails utterly to appeal to us,
or even assumes the ugly shape of an 'ought not.'
In brief, the ethical consciousness must circle ah
urbe in urbem ; it can never speak ad orbem.
"Framed for the service of a free-bom will,"
the highest manifestation of moral well-being, and
well-doing, no sooner walks the earth than adjourn-
ment is taken, to tear it to pieces in committee, as it
were. It W2is framed. Ethical realization wrought,
as it must be, under stringent conditions, reveals itself
as a kind of magnificent failure, when conditions
254 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
alter never so little. Nay, the more its magnificence
is lauded, the more its failure tends to incense those
whom the magic circle excludes. Confined to a
place or people, exuberant in a circumscribed period,
the moth and rust of this world break through, and
lo, it has gone to destruction.
Here, then, we light upon the reason why religion
has often cast suspicion upon 'works.' One good
custom can corrupt the world, because morality is
predestined to end in a series of compromises. Has
the 'immoral' man been detected invariably in sot
or sensualist, and in none other? By no means.
As often he has horrified the "great and good ones
of the earth" in the guise of a graceless iconoclast —
pounding at the foundations of their consecrated
usages. What else was Jesus himself ? Was he not
" possessed of a devil " ? To
''Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour,"
is not given to morality, because —
"Pity would be no more
If we did not make somebody poor,
And Mercy no more could be
If all were as happy as we.
" And mutual fear brings Peace,
Till the selfish loves increase;
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 255
Then Cruelty knits a snare,
And spreads his bait with care.
" He sits down with holy fears,
And waters the ground with tears;
Then Humility takes its root
Underneath his foot.
" Soon spreads the dismal shade
Of Mystery over his head,
And the caterpillar and fly
Feed on the Mystery.
" And it bears the fruit of Deceit,
Ruddy and sweet to eat.
And the raven his nest has made
In its thickest shade.
" The gods of the earth and sea
Sought through nature to find this tree,
But their search was all in vain:
There grows one in the human Brain."
This is ''the human abstract," as a profound genius
in mysticism saw so clearly. The 'ought to be,'
the completer it 'is/ earns the frown of the 'ought
not ' ; and so man passes from likeness to likeness of
the good, particularizing from age to age, but uni-
versalizing never. Well-being truly arrives, but only
on agreement that it adjourn, the sooner the better, —
to give place to well-being ! Small wonder that many
seers and poets, astray in the ethical maze, should
256 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
have likened human existence to a pragmatic cycle,
arising, spreading, embracing, vanishing, merely to
return and repeat itself in the same empty cere-
monies, world without end.
Time forbids me to dwell in detail upon the con-
tradictions and compromises easily discoverable by
any thoughtful person in the current standards of
his own ethical environment. Suffice it to say that,
thrust back where deepest satisfaction might be
anticipated, mankind appeals to religion. The
adjournment of well-being forces this alternative.
We yearn for assurance, and are bidden — to keep
up the struggle. Therefore we seek another coun-
try, which is an heavenly, in the hope that the peace
that passeth understanding may dispel uncertainty.
Great as is the fallacy that seeks universal explana-
tions from positive science and 'exact' history, the
attempt to extract comfort from 'ethical culture,'
or to escape religion by recourse to institutionalism,
may be falser still. Science and history we know,
but this assumes the dangerous guise of an enemy
within the gates. So, in conclusion, we approach
common representations of the religious conscious-
ness, to see whether we shall fare any better at their
hands.
Taken on its practical side, especially, the moral
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 257
life appears as a restless and, sometimes, confused
state of effort. It demands a curious union of per-
severance and concession. Even when it reaches
comparative stability, in a distinctive culture, dis-
quiet dances close attendance. In all likelihood, we
must agree to accept these limitations as inevitable;
circumstances compel us ; otherwise, morality would
not exist. For, in practice, men are finite beings,
subjects of a spatial and temporal order. They
exhibit morality, because they cannot escape the fet-
ters of their mortal lot. Yet, on the contrary, they
could scarce maintain an endless struggle, sure of its
futility, last and first. Despite appearances, they
affirm, by their very alacrity, that their persistence
through the strife witnesses to copartnership in a
mission destined to final success.
*'Grow old along with me!
The best is yet to be. . . .
" Rejoice we are allied
To That which doth provide
And not partake, effect and not receive!
A spark disturbs our clod;
Nearer we hold of God
Who gives, than of His tribes that take, I must believe."
The nature of the system — ' spiritual ' plus ' mate-
rial ' — wherein man subserves his function as an
258 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
ethical being, thus comes in question. Practical
though morality be, it is also systematic, and there-
fore presupposes constitutive principles. It pro-
ceeds on a basis little distinguishable from faith.
The relevant motive-force, so to speak, involves
decided convictions. As science postulates, without
proof, that this frame of things is rational, and
rational in such a way that the human intellect can
grasp and use it, so morality, nothing loth, lays down
initial propositions peculiar to its 'universe.' Stated
briefly, even baldly, they are as follows : There would
be no moral life unless man felt that, in sum, charac-
ter attains enhanced power and fuller expression in
ethical activity; and that, more rather than less,
the consequences of endeavour represent victories
whose benefits cannot be lost. Now this intimates
that the practical career issues from an ideal insight.
A new light suffuses the harsh disappointments of
common day. We discover a time-process, fore-
doomed to failure in every particular case. Yet we
must face the correlative fact that this process justifies
itself, and anticipates its own completion, by reference
to a perfection seen with the eye of faith only ; even
foolish mortals avoid a course where certain dis-
aster is demonstrable beforehand. Were this ideal
world to become real, however, morality would be
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 259
abolished as ipso facto inconceivable or superfluous.
Nevertheless, the existence of ethics betokens the
conviction that this ideal possesses ultimate meaning.
Hereupon morality has abdicated in favour of reli-
gion. For religion pivots on the belief, not that these
insights merely hint some vague eventuality, but that
their object is the sole actual existence. The very
imperfection of the moral life involves appeal to that
supra-ethical reality which religion terms God. In
short, another view of the entire system of experience
looms in sight. The immemorial minor contradic-
tions of diurnal affairs reveal a major contradiction
between possibilities, known to be of one kind, and
a present reality, conceived to be of totally different
kind. For morality is a realization of human
nature, just like any other — digestion, say. It
offers a partial disclosure of a broken unity. Reli-
gion, on the contrary, seeks imequivocal realization
of the unity as a whole. But this seems entirely
impracticable, because complete realization must
include the ideal insights which, in turn, cannot
find room within the realm of finite being, cribbed,
cabined, and confined in a temporal series.
This inexplicable disharmony shows us why
even so great a religious genius as Augustine felt
constrained to speak of life as "a monstrous para-
26o MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
dox." Take him from any side you please, man is
himself a huge contradiction. "What a piece of
work is a man ! How noble in reason ! how infinite
in faculty ! in form and moving how express and
admirable ! in action how like an angel ! in appre-
hension how like a god ! the beauty of the world !
the paragon of animals ! And yet, to me, what is
this quintessence of dust? man delights not me,
no, nor woman neither." No prof o under difficulty
assails reason, faith, and hope. Art represents
Jesus with a crown of thorns, Nero with a chaplet
of roses; she omits to add that the thorns blossom
into roses, that the roses fade into thorns. Which
picture holds truth? Or, are both true? Or, is
there no truth, after all? We must not anticipate
that an otiose, heritable conception of religion will
avail much against problems like these. Nay, if
we muster courage to play the game squarely, we
must rather expect to discover that, sometimes,
religion itself falls within the grasp of the wholesale
contradiction. For, were it merely a transient from
a distant clime, it would lack the touch of nature
that makes the whole world kin. So, on any count,
if it can effect aught to deliver, we are bound to view
it as incidental to man's universe, and therefore as
a subject of the preestablished discord. We dare
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 26 1
not go forward in blindness to even the strangest
turn of the wheel. If life be a paradox, and if religion
be its inseparable accident, our holiest Edens cannot
escape the trail of the serpent. In some aspects of
it, religion, which ''builds a heaven in hell's despair,"
also "builds a hell in heaven's despite " !
The controversies that still surround the word
afford abundant proof, not necessarily that its mean-
ing is doubtful, but that it may be interpreted in va-
rious, perhaps mutually exclusive, senses. Speaking
generally, we know Religion as religions. While,
condescending upon further detail, several conven-
tions affect our apprehension of any one religion.
The prism of experience splits the pure white light
into many coloured rays. This weird contingency
will claim our notice in what remains to-night.
Customary associations control our uncritical
acceptation of many abstract words. Linguistic
denominations, like thousand-dollar bills, pass
current at their face value — we do not think of the
cents, much less of the reasons for the numerous,
and shifting, exchange-worths represented. In
short, the sign is presented or taken with an indis-
tinct consciousness of its meaning, or without reflex-
ion, or with positive error. Further, as civilization
grows more complex, and portions of life gain rela-
262 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
tive independence, this tendency to symbolize waxes
mightily. If one were to pull a friend up short,
with a request to define 'Government,' ' State,' ' Con-
stitution,' 'Commerce,' 'Jurisdiction,' and so on,
the exact constituents would not be forthcoming in
every case. As for these, so for 'Religion,' it is
easier to rest in a customary import, fixed by usage
in a given society. Regarded thus, religion tends
to symbolize one of several things as a rule. And,
when you have heard the list, pray ask yourselves
this question seriously : When these accompaniments
have been stated, how many of your acquaintances
and neighbours could you name who do not conceive
religion to consist in one, or in a combination, of the
views mentioned; and, if they be inadequate, what
then?
(i) Religion may be identified with the govern-
ment, order, and practices of an institution — an
ecclesiastical organization, say. All these, once
more, vary from time to time, from place to place.
Racial and cultural tendencies mould, if they do not
control, specific manifestations of the kind. (2) It
maybe identified with a system of doctrine. Here,
again, racial and social tendencies intervene. One
people may be so constituted psychologically, or its
stock of knowledge may be so crude, that its creed
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 263
counts no more than superstition with a folk in a
different stage of development. Nay, within the
same nation, the belief of one group may seem folly
to another. (3) It may be identified with peculiar
events alleged to have broken the normal current
of history. Here, yet again, racial and social pre-
dilections play an immense part. Jesus, a child of
the Orient, was destined to conquer the West, but,
equally, to miss formative influence in the East.
Recall, too, that the religions which rule humanity
to-day were all of Oriental origin. The Occident
has evolved science, invented machinery, built battle-
ships — and christened them in the name of the God
of love by His consecrated ministers ; she has never
created a great religion, unless, indeed, Christianity
be credited to her. Accordingly, it requires little
perspicacity to observe that, in all three cases
equally, the compromises, even contradictions,
characteristic of the moral consciousness, appear
on the scene, with the usual consequences. The
adjournment of well-being presents itself in new
phases of its protean shapes.
(i) It would be fantastic to assert that an insti-
tution, developed in the course of history, could be
universalized so as to provide a fundamental ex-
planation of experience. All institutions exist to
264 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
subserve practical ends and, on this account, they
fail us when we seek consistent theory. To use
the language of religion, no one would allege that
the visible church and the kingdom of heaven are
identical. The church appeared, and still con-
tinues, as a means under the form of time; we are
bound to conceive the kingdom of heaven as a per-
fect community under the form of eternity. Thus
the question arises. Can any religious organization
escape the limitations that cling to all incidents in
a temporal series? The attitude of anti-religious
rationalists, and their reasons for it, prove the
negative. Critics of the church fail to perceive that
the dross of time and space defies the refiner's art;
or they blink the situation wilfully. They return
again and again with disagreeable charges. They
draw lurid pictures of the apposition between pro-
fession and practice; they wax mordant over the
shallow compromises forced upon the church by
the flesh and the world — by moral conventions, by
the economic order. Doubtless, lively prejudice
jaundices their vision frequently. Nevertheless,
one may as well admit that they appeal to notorious
facts. Still, their abuse derives its sting from the
assumption that the church represents heaven upon
earth, that it furnishes a complete epitome of the
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 265
religious consciousness. If they were careful to
recall that it is no more than instrumental to the
major ends of man's being, their capital would be
gone. As one type of human organization, it must
submit to influences which no leap of imagination
can transfer to an ideal community. Whatever
man may become sub specie ceternitatiSy we have
every reason to believe that he will not remain what
he is now sub specie ecclesicE. In worship, for
instance, we make common cause with some whose
characters we despise ; and the same holds of other
churchly activities — we may have to serve with
them on a vestry. So far as our present partial in-
sight reveals, we are perfectly certain that these
relations would render heaven a mockery. Yet they
bother us on every hand in our temporal expedients.
We compromise with them, and contradict our high-
est aspirations, because we are unable to help our-
selves. Nor does the paradox finish here. The
compromises and contradictions are tolerated for
the sake of these very aspirations. They are tools,
placed in our hands, willy-nilly, here and now.
"Can wisdom be put in a silver rod,
Or love in a golden bowl ? " v '
Assuredly not. Yet, straightway, we proceed to
cramp them thus. In short, the visible church, as
266 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
an apparition in time, bows its head in consent to the
adjournment of well-being. No doubt, in separation
from such societies, we may fall upon greater defect
than when joined with them. But this lends no
colour to the naive idea that the bare fact of asso-
ciation embodies an adequate ideal. Briefly, the
church, because ordered thus and so in the past
and present, necessarily lags behind the very spiritual
fulness that it exists to proclaim. To quote a com-
monplace of sarcasm, we ought to remind ourselves
constantly that, under temporal limits, the thirteenth
vote represents the Holy Spirit only too often. Here
Fate touches our workaday world with the grim
humour of truth; and, within her own borders, we
must abide her awful irony. A temporal organiza-
tion sways from side to side; otherwise it would
die, for the tortuous movement attests its vital
quality. This same record of contradiction forms
an indispensable stage in our 'progress' to anything
ideal. No matter with what fine qualities we credit
our instrument, especially when first made, sooner
or later the inherent deceptions will come to light.
This is the law of sin in our members. Indeed, one
need not go further than the apostolic writings for
lambent illustrations of the hapless truth. Vacu-
ous fatuity and smug self-assurance beset religious
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 267
institutionalism. They tell the price payable for
ideal symbolization in objects that sink easily to the
unideal. The poor are always with us ; but, worse
luck, so is Seth Pecksniff. "'There is no deception,
ladies and gentlemen, all is peace, a holy calm
pervades me.' . . . His genius lay in ensnaring
parents and guardians, and pocketing premiums.
. . . 'We are all hypocrites. . . . The only dif-
ference between you and the rest . . . is . . . that
you never have a confederate or partner in your
juggling; you would deceive everybody, even those
who practise the same art; and have a way with
you, as if you — he, he, he ! — as if you really be-
lieved yourself. I'd lay a handsome wager now,
if I laid wagers, which I don't and never did, that
you keep up appearances by a tacit understanding,
even before your own daughters here.'" Thus it
must ever be with a temporal construction. Con-
victed of shortcoming, it abases itself before the
ideal, and, at the same moment, puffs itself up with
false pride, flaunting the presumption that the ideal
can find habitation nowhere else. Evidently, then,
we must not seek for complete satisfaction of the
religious consciousness in the visible church. A
round of pietistic ceremonies, so called, is no more
religious than a round of devotions to duty — the / .
U
268 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
i
mother's, physician's, patriot's, scholar's. Only
when mediated by that tension of the whole man
which we term religion do these practices and self-
sacrifices acquire religious import. Therefore, to
mistake the church and things ecclesiastical for
religion is no more than a concession to the world,
likely to be fraught with disappointment, pain, or,
perhaps, disaster, when real stress arrives. For the
religious consciousness looks to the invisible things
of a timeless perfection. Nay, would not the church
become actively irreligious — has it not actually
been so in times past — if it did not demand some-
thing higher than itself? If we remember this, I
think we shall escape imscathed from many diffi-
culties that worry good souls to-day.
(2) Similarly, even granted that religion requires
an irreducible minimum of doctrine, it is plain that
the system proceeds from the human mind. Con-
sequently, doctrine occupies precisely the same
position as any other pronouncement of reason. It
is at bottom a series of hypotheses, evolved to ac-
count for certain ebullitions of inner experience; it
cannot pretend to complete truth. While it may
be matter of immense practical importance that
groups of men possess the conviction that some spir-
itual asseverations are true, this means only that
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 269
they find them helpful. In other words, the rela-
tive character of knowledge always infects single
propositions, and never so emphatically as when an
attempt is made to render them the sole vehicles of
truth. When a Christian cannot explain to you
why doctrine presents God as triune, and flies to
'mystery^ for refuge, what can you expect as to
truth? When a pious soul is unable even to com-
prehend why there cannot be any * relation * between
an absolute God and a separate individual like
himself, how can we anticipate that he knows the
truth about an 'atonement'? In short, dogma is
either too simple or too sophisticated to be capable
of universal application. Too simple, because it
neglects to fathom the presuppositions of the com-
plexities it undertakes to define; too sophisticated,
because it winks the eye at man's undoubted power
to destroy or alter his own conclusions at any mo-
ment. It is a mere piece of self-deception to sup-
pose, for example, that we could not compose a more
adequate creed to-day than in the fourth century.
Yet we let the old statements stand, because, as I
heard an ecclesiastic say once, "you can drive a
coach and four through them." The point to be
remembered is that you can perform this interesting
feat upon any creed possible within the logical pro-
270 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
cesses of reason. The secret ways of the religious
consciousness defy all doctrinal anatomy. More-
over, doctrinal conclusions, when they suffice mo-
mentarily, are no more than reasons post factum.
In a sense, every creed must be a forlorn hope. It
rationalizes a condition which, in its very essence,
eludes abstract reason. As a reflective, and second-
ary arrangement, it betrays all the usual defects of
the hypothesis-tribe. And the curious error, that a
series of set propositions, relative to their day and
generation, must contain the whole truth of religion,
amounts simply to additional evidence of man's
reluctance to face thoroughgoing thought about
spiritual things. This blunder, be it said in pass-
ing, has always been a characteristic of English-
speaking protestantism. Our racial tendency to
evade, or falsify, spiritual issues, is well understood
by the continental peoples.^
^ The following is typical of the view held by the Latin peoples:
"This race, bodily energetic and resolute like no other, is morally
childish. Wonder and awe before questions unfathomable to the
Englishman make him subservient, and establish the base of his
mental discipline. In other races there is not to be found such
respect for tradition, or worship of established forms, or admira-
tion for great men, all the social traces that lessen the individual
carat of genius, and so cement with solidity the whole mass of
the greatness of the people. The English, who are penetrated
by the Rationalistic civilization of the Continent, principally of
German origin, confess that intellectual cowardice is the only
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 27 1
A creed, then, is not religion. It is obviously a
form of words, valid for those who fathered it, and
intended by them to define some experiences be-
lieved to be incidental to religion. It is doomed to
pass or change, just like any other theory, — in
science, for instance, — and this because its content
partakes in the relativity of its age. So, once more,
if we would bear these things in mind, many diffi-
culties that distress devout souls to-day would van-
ish into thin air. For a creed, like an ecclesiastical
organization, is an instrument, and a most tempo-
rary one at that. To put it in place of its creator,
the religious consciousness, is to invite needless
misunderstanding, perhaps eventual apostacy. For,
in the nature of the case, dogmas constantly become
irreconcilable with known facts. And to insist that
the religious consciousness accept falsehood for its
portion appears, to some at least, suspiciously akin
to the sin against the Holy Spirit.
kind of cowardice possible for Englishmen, but that lays hold of
them to an excessive degree. ... It is even yet difi&cult for an
unbeliever to pass as a gentleman, a good Englishman, and an
honoured man. Hence comes a custom that, without being posi-
tively a vice, is coated with hypocrisy — cant, the ritual of in-
destructible conventionality." The England of To-day, Oliveira
Martins, pp. 94-95. Some would maintain that, in the protes-
tantism of the United States, these conditions are even more
accentuated.
272 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
(3) Everyone knows, in a general way, that Chris-
tianity owed much to the religion of the Hebrews.
Everyone knows also, I suppose, that Hebrew reli-
gion adopted a peculiar attitude to history. It
selected particular events, limited in time, and en-
dowed them with timeless significance. In short,
innocent of causal sequence, it elevated physical
phenomena to the level of supernatural manifesta-
tions. Or, more strictly, thanks to animism, his-
torical sequents were transformed into dogmas —
they "had some unique influence on the relation
between God and man." ^ This tendency passed
over to Christianity, as the creeds show plainly,
and historical occurrences, coming to be represented
as transactions between the divine Being and hu-
manity, assumed the character of opera operata.
The consequence was a most unhappy union between
two series of experiences, each amenable to wholly
different kinds of judgement. Impossible, some-
times offensive or trivial, incidents, as history must
count them, were thus forced upon Christianity as
part of its permanent content. Accordingly, when
scientific method annexed history, our religion could
not escape assault, even impeachment. It had sunk
* Some Dogmas of Religion, John McTaggart Ellis McTaggart,
p. 2.
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 273
unwittingly to the level of causal sequence, and had
staked its veracity upon temporal and spatial cate-
gories. Now, matters religious win to verification
at first hand in the concrete consciousness of devout
men. Yet here they were, jumbled with fiction-fact
capable of estimate by none save trained specialists.
Results guaranteed by the emotion, sentiment, and
aspiration of living souls lost their force, because
associated with antique stories at once dubious in
themselves, and beyond evaluation by every average
believer. Religious idealism, essentially metahis-
torical and metaphysical in character, was changed,
by a Circean spell, into a localized emeute, subject
to disproof at any time by critical investigation, by
the discovery of fresh documents, or by novel archae-
ological finds. Besides, the farther history goes, the
more definite her methods, the surer her results, the
worse the plight of a priori dogmatism. "If it is
the methodic cardinal proposition of the science of
to-day that we have to explain every condition as the
causally determined development out of a preced-
ing one, this excludes on principle the appearance
of any condition, event, action, or personality which
is not explicable out of the preceding conditions
and according to the laws of genesis in general." ^
* Evolution and Theology, O. Pfleiderer, p. 9.
T
274 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Moreover, as I have said already, this science has
no more than reached lusty youth. "If thou hast
run with the footmen, and they have wearied thee,
then how canst thou contend with horses ? and if in
the land of peace, wherein thou trustedst, they
wearied thee, then how wilt thou do in the swelling
of Jordan?"^ The position is so intolerable that
misapprehension must lurk somewhere. Does our
Christianity depend ultimately upon a profession of
belief in incidents, some known to be imaginary and
absurd, others likely to be exploded any day, or does
it not ? I fear we must reckon to learn that the for-
mer alternative is nothing short of an insult to our
religion. It cannot depend upon a dead past, or
consist of 'stuff' meet to be tossed in a blanket by
scientific criticism. And yet, this is what many good
folk are taught to deem indispensable by ofhcial
defenders of the faith. The irony of it is unspeak-
able. Thus, if we could rid ourselves of this, as of
the other secondary manifestations, we would escape
much mental dispeace, much spiritual bewilder-
ment, and, above all, we could conserve our religious
strength for things which are of the last moment to
our present personal lives. For, an event in history,
subject to temporal bounds, must be delivered alto-
^ Jeremiah xii. 5.
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 275
gether from this imprisonment — must cease to be
merely historical, in short — if it is to acquire con-
structive significance for the religious consciousness.
No one will fathom Christianity, for instance, till
he realizes that the Gospels are not sober biogra-
phies, but cataracts of faith. But, if we will confuse
religion with births and deaths whose very attesta-
tion is woefully fragmentary, and therefore obscure,
we must not wince if historians maim, aye, destroy,
our cherished faith. Nor can we be too clear that
special pleading will avail nought to restore the
shattered fragments. Once more the adjournment
of well-being has overtaken us, and, if current signs
intimate anything, in a form penetrating beyond all
precedent.
It must be insisted, however, that, although mo-
rality, the church, creeds, and historical phenomena
put us off when we seek ultimate satisfaction from
them, they are not cast into the scrap-heap there-
upon. Men would not tend to identify religion with
an institution, a confession, or a beauteous char-
acter, unless they had some natural justification.
All these serve, or illustrate, religion in so far as they
offer fit sphere for the play of consecrated senti-
ment, touch it to fine issues, or conserve its hallowed
associations. Indeed, such achievements of the
276 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
human spirit exert legitimate influence, and are sur-
charged with significance in degree only as emotion
and aspiration pulsate through them. But to mistake
them for a full, true, and particular translation of reli-
gion, as it wells up from the unplumbed deeps of psy-
chical peace-in-strife, is to invite heavy penalties.
They face towards things seen and temporal ; it yearns
towards the unseen and eternal. They localize —
this is their distinctive function ; it tries to escape
locality. They suffer constant change; it would
partake of an existence that is the same yesterday,
to-day, and for ever. Accordingly, the inevitable
march of our own consciousness drives us from finite
forms, useful, nay, necessary, in their order. From
religions, and religious machinery, we are compelled
to pass to Religion itself, in the hope that, by its
strength, we may be delivered from the bitter dis-
appointments wherewith the adjournment of well-
being is fraught, thanks to the compromises and
contradictions inherent in mundane affairs. We
have followed the gleam from the first and, foiled,
nowhere more than in its chosen representations, have
missed the one thing needful. At all events, * Chris-
tian truth' has eluded our search. And now it
seems that if, haply, we are to establish any such
vantage for experience, we must appeal to the reli-
THE ADJOURNMENT OF WELL-BEING 277
gious consciousness in its own proper nature. Pos-
sibly, we shall have to abandon Christianity as a
religion, and essay the formidable problem. Does
religious truth find its most eminent expression
through any convictions concerning God in man
defensible before contemporary insight? Or, more
directly. Has 'Christian truth' such faithfulness to
human nature that it can be regarded, not as an inci-
dent in, but as the ultimate expression of, Religion ?
LECTURE VII
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF
When we take an inventory of experience, we are
prone to ask, Where does it attain highest definition
or assurance, where are its resuhs least broken
by misgiving? And we answer, with no uncertain
sound. In knowledge, of course. The temper of
the present age, more, perhaps, than even that of
the scBculum rationalisticum, the eighteenth century,
harps on this view. As never before, men stand
shoulder to shoulder, banded in a unitary effort to
satisfy passion through knowledge, heedless of Faust's
mischance. As never before, knowledge spells
power, power to invade and exploit physical forces.
Yet any investigator will tell you frankly — and
the greater his eminence the more incisive his tone
— that the conquests of settled knowledge form but
a fragment, incalculably minute, wrested from the
illimitable unknown. Mr. Edison has had the
temerity to state the relation in terms of some in-
conceivable numerical ratio. On the impressive
278
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 279
occasion of his professorial jubilee, surrounded by
the world's leaders of science and learning, amid
a hush that chastened all who had the good fortune
to be present, the late Lord Kelvin said : —
''One word characterizes the most strenuous of
the efforts for the advancement of science that I
have made perseveringly during fifty-five years;
that word is Failure. I know no more of elec-
tric and magnetic force, or of the relation between
ether, electricity, and ponderable matter, or of phem-
ical affinity, than I knew and tried to teach my
students of natural philosophy fifty years ago in
my first session as professor. Something of sadness
must come of failure ; but in the pursuit of science,
inborn necessity to make the effort brings with it
much of the certaminis gaudia, and saves the natu-
ralist from being wholly miserable, perhaps even
allows him to be fairly happy in his daily work." ^
Here, observe. Lord Kelvin voiced what he knew,
and did not venture upon any of his theological
pronouncements, notorious, occasionally, for their
wayward naivete. Of a truth, we are immersed
literally in secrets that lie beyond ken, whose very
existence we do not so much as suspect, in all prob-
ability. At the same time, it would be foolish to
^ Lord Kelvin, Professor of Natural Philosophy in the Uni-
versity of Glasgow, i846-i8gg, pp. 70-71. (Glasgow, 1899.)
28o MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
allege that the hidden processes of 'matter,' 'life,'
or what not, constitute mysteries, or evidence a supra-
rational dimension. The whole body of science
warrants the inference that the cosmos cannot be
ultra-rational and remain a cosmos. Unreason
makes its bed in chaos. Our being may seem mys-
terious, but only because, as the last expression of a
developmental effluence, it betrays unforeseen quali-
ties. If the universe contain anything mysterious,
if it add to pure reason aught that betokens another
and, as some would argue, a higher level, man must
search his own heart for the clew to the unique riddle.
The opaque depths of the natural order do indeed
defy most cunning plummet ; but in the recesses of
the human soul elements flourish for which * nature '
appears to present no unmistakable precedent.
So, by one of those amazing paradoxes, apt to herald
the near presence of truth, the penumbra of belief
hints the existence, possibly the solution, of problems
which, did they belong to a strange ' external ' world,
would lie hidden irrevocably in the profundities of
the intractable unknown. Thus, allowing for the
imperfection of knowledge, we see, by a strange
shift of outlook, that we may satisfy our passion
through fulness of life, if not by fitting it to the
Procrustes' frame of intellect. For, in his quest
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 28 1
after an ultimate reality, man must either call a halt
at immediate discretion, or carry appeal to his ex-
perience as a whole. The unknown that immerses
him is at once most baffling and most hopeful pre-
cisely within the elastic circle of his self -mediating
spirit. ''For what man knoweth the things of a
man, save the spirit of man which is in him?"^
And I am not aware that this, the human oppor-
tunity, manifests itself more characteristically than
in religion, the activity that differentiates manhood
most of all from the beasts that perish. Thus * ap-
prehended,' as the apostle says wisely, one dismisses
the unknown that still lurks in the womb of futurity,
by transforming original emotions into vital con-
victions. The surprising ability to universalize
self, the individual, breaks forth and, idealism aid-
ing, the believer descries truth in his acute sense of
union with a perfect reality. In short, religion trans-
figures beyond aught else, because it divines that
presence of the whole which alone endows the part
with value and intimation.
If religion lack ability to penetrate the penumbra
completely, at least it can diffuse a light wherein
many dark places shine luminous. Moreover,
the process neither originates nor proceeds by way
^ I Corinthians ii. 11.
282 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of ruthless dictation; it signifies for the simple
reason that it is self-generated and self-sustained.
In one angle of his experience, that is, man joins
himself to ideal completion through the natural
operation of his own spirit. Michael Angelo, who
hid these things in his heart, so that he was impelled
by them to his wonderful achievement, has recorded
the movement with the profound insight born of
personal sympathy.
"Yes! Hope may with my strong desire keep pace,
And I be undeluded, unbetrayed.
For if of our affections none find grace
In sight of Heaven, then wherefore hath God made
The world which we inhabit? Better plea
Love cannot have, than that in loving thee
Glory to that eternal peace is paid,
Who such divinity to thee imparts
As hallows and makes pure all gentle hearts.
His hope is treacherous only whose love dies
With beauty which is varying every hour.
But in chaste hearts, uninfluenced by the power
Of outward change, there blooms a deathless flower
That breathes on earth the air of paradise."
Reduced to cold prose, this means that religion
possesses momentum to pierce the penumbra in
degree as it rounds itself out in imaginative aspira-
tion. Its creative prescription provides a foretaste
— our only one, as all saints would attest — of final
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF^ 283
truth. If the harassed and bruised self, sensible
of utter imperfection, can. cheat the dreary doom
decreed by a blind Fate, it has but a single resource.
It must master its helplessness by consecrating its
career to something perfect which it perceives, as
in a looking-glass, at the centre of its own being.
Tied by the body to the ambiguous earth, it never-
theless claims citizenship in heaven by virtue of
undoubted power to soar thither. Its distinctive
genius displays itself when, breaking through the
penumbra of knowledge, it grasps reality, as it must
account reality, in the penumbra of its own irradiat-
ing harmony. Intensely sensible of failure, dejected
by defect, it yet creates faith that at once justifies
failure, and renders the necessity of defect tolerable.
Accordingly, it is encompassed by no forbidding
mist of things unknown, but by the stimulative air
of a larger experience wherein knowledge plays a
subordinate, if indispensable, part in the middle
distance. Like clouds in an autumn twilight, intel-
lectual skies are never the same for successive mo-
ments ; but the reason for religion abides unaltered.
"And at his side we urge, to-day,
The immemorial quest, and old complaint."
As in the elder days, when Springtime, and Sun, and
Ptah, and Ashur, and Zeus were mighty to save, so
284 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
now, the same fears compel the same hopes, the same
perplexities imply the same remedies, — the same in-
dividual proclaims, 'Lo, I am universal,' and so it is.
Thousands in our own dull midst would realize
this were they not stupefied by that ''torpor of as-
surance" which curses organized Christianity to-
day. From their eyes, too, the eternal soul gazes
out, and in faithlessness to its latent capacities —
because nothing will induce it to look in. Having
eaten of the Dead Sea fruit served up by a utili-
tarian education that has lost touch with relative
values, imagination has fallen upon numbness, and
spiritual originality has sunk low. Unaware of
its own dynamic thrust, the modern soul knows no
awe, and so its heart is seldom enlarged. In its
petty irreverence it worships the barren individual,
and the universalism of its suggestive penumbra is
veiled in a fog of picayune methodism, fit habitat
for prosaic citizens imtouched by passion, but no
refuge for a living personality blessed with the liberty
wherewith Christ and His prophetic forerunners
have made men free. Assemble the master poets,
painters, musicians, patriots, philosophers, lovers;
put them to the question; ask them their receipt
for power, for winsomeness, for revelation. You will
find that, in all cases, it consisted in ability to raise
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 285
self above self into unity with something worth
permanent devotion. In a word, it was identical
with religion, though less intense because its object
centred, not in the perfection of reality, but in a
symbol — beauty, colour, harmony, or other limited
affair. Thus, if religion fail to touch us as they
were touched, how can we sense its penumbra, how
much more must we fall short of ability to pierce
through to the truth it illustrates? For religion
is nothing but the eternal witness within human
experience to the present incarnation of God in the
idealizing surge of man. Or, adopting Ruskin's
great phrase, religion consists in ''veracity of vision.'*
By it the individual has become the thing he predicts.
A human being encounters, or, rather, contains truth
here; for, from a finite sectary, quoting the words
of a tortured book, reciting propositions mumbo-
jumbo, or clutching desperately at the skirts of a
temporal institution, he is transfigured into a cathol-
icized member of the perfect reality immanent in
his own soul. Untrammelled by the factual super-
stitions of our wooden neology, veritable pagans
enjoyed calm to feel this.
^'It is not needful to lift up the hands to heaven,
or to make petition to the temple-servants to permit
us to come close to the ear of the image of God, as
286 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
though he could better hear us there; God is nigh
thee, God is with thee, God is in thee. Yes, I say
again, a holy spirit dwells in us, to mark and observe
our evil and our good ; as we treat him, so he treats
us. No man is good without God's aid ; nor can,
unhelped by Him, rise superior to Fate." ^
The penumbra of belief, then, as diffused by the
inbred freedom of the spirit, the permanent guar-
antee of religion, is riven by shafts of inward light
that throw radiant beams upon truth and reality.
Or, if you prefer the audacity, — and religion can
never be audacious enough, — religion is the sole
activity of human experience that renders truth and
reality inevitable. But Religion, remember, not
mental suppositions concerning it. For truth and
reality are naught except as shot forth by man's
psychical claim of right; they are always disem-
bodied types of self -revelation.
Notice, next, that religion tends to simplify life;
it snatches one from turbulence, and leaves him alone
with primeval fact.
"All other life is living Death,
A world where none but Phantoms dwell,
A wind, a sound, a voice, a breath,
A tinkling of a camel bell."
^ Ep. xli, Seneca.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 287
What may this import ? Some judgements, indispen-
sable in a region of space and time, have been left
behind ; need for them exists no more. For example,
in dealing with ethical matters, it is impossible to
avoid classifications that introduce approval and
contempt. But the believer, though he contemn
himself out and out, cannot forget the unity with
perfection which is his already. A destiny so tre-
mendous evaporates contempt, but not entirely.
Condemnation preserves itself, but only in the mood
that justifies such exclamations as, "What is man
that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man,
that thou visitest him?"^ Approval, likewise,
subserves no office here. The work is the Lord's,
not man's. Accordingly, one ought not to anticipate
that, within the penumbra of belief, logical proposi-
tions, ranged stiff and severe, will rule the conclu-
sions of faith. And, to this extent, the dimension of
religion may be termed supra-rational — not supra-
experiential. Let us listen to what the foremost
among living philosophers has to say in elucidation
of this point, so easily and so constantly misconceived.
I cite Mr. Bradley, because his ruthless dialectic
admits of no partiality to the religious consciousness.
The object of religion —
^ Psalms viii. 4.
288 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
"is neither an abstract idea in the head, nor one
particular thing or quahty, nor any collection of such
things or qualities, nor any phrase which stands for
one of them or a collection of them. In short, it is
nothing finite. It cannot be a thing or person in
the world ; it cannot exist in the world, as a part of
it, or as this or that course of events in time ; it can-
not be the 'All,' the sum of things or persons, —
since, if one is not divine, no putting of ones together
will beget divinity. All this it is not. Its positive
character is that it is real ; and further, on examining
what we find in the religious consciousness, we dis-
cover that it is the ideal self considered as realized
and real. The ideal self, which in morality is to
be, is here the real ideal which truly is." ^
In a range where the strait canons of reason meet
the deliquescent touch of affection, desire, and will,
experience at length sights truth, appreciates reality.
From these it fashions itself a new life. Conflict
still persists, but its incidental' terms belong to a
single whole, that forms the presupposition of their
possibility. This whole, the transitive human spirit,
possesses efficacy, accordingly, to direct its steps
beyond strife to peace, beyond appearances to real-
ity. The inner unity of a given selfhood exhibits its
truth by degrees, mediated in a series of elements
^ Ethical Studies, F. H, Bradley, pp. 284-285.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 289
indissolubly one through their existence in and for
this selfhood. In each of the parts the principle of
the whole operates in its peculiar completeness. That
is to say, religion is ultra-rational, because, as a
distinctive process of experience in its entirety, it can-
not be reduced to a form of knowledge. Or, more
explicitly, it intimates, and with authority, the
presence of a disposition native to idealism. As
noetic self -righteousness would judge, it pleads
guilty to mysticism. In this mysticism the penum-
bral feature of belief comes to potent birth. Man
dares to step beyond the bare affirmation that the
object of his utmost desire is the reality, and seals
his faith by the bold assertion that no other reality
exists save in this. The personal self -identification
provides the foundation whose builder and maker is
God. Here, finally, all obstacles beaten down, our
common humanity agrees that it has grasped the
substance of things unseen. Backslide it may, but
never to the old pit of finite satisfaction. Life has
ceased to be an interminable experiment, — has
defined itself as an imperative summons to imme-
diate participation in the complete ideal.
Belief sheds a penumbra where light and shade
tend to mingle; so much may be taken as nearly
axiomatic. It refers continually to a higher order,
u
290 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
unseen yet pervasive, the incontestable touchstone
of a worth that dispels degradation from all pres-
ent things, and promises their ultimate renovation.
Prosaic rationalism, with its abstract articulations
at second hand, has misprized this view, sometimes
in cavalier, one might even say slatternly, style.
If faith is to obtain a fair hearing, its mystical ref-
erence must receive impartial treatment. It seeks
no generosity, but it requires us to face its special
synthesis of empirical facts. Misinterpretation en-
sues unavoidably if an attempt be made to swallow
religion at a gulp, as it were. Alternatives press
for consideration when mysticism becomes an issue.
For mysticism happens to be one thing as a wrought
system, another, and widely different, as an access
of ''man's delight in the work of God." We are
compelled to distinguish, in short, between the
fatuity of the philosophy and the inspiration of the
mood. When the mystic thinker wings it into the
empyrean, his religion is imperilled by very excess,
" Pinnacled dim in the intense inane."
But, on the contrary, his noble elevation partakes
of the magic susceptibility inseparable from genuine
religious conviction.
In the first place, then, systematic mysticism
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 29I
would lift men above this world, and abolish re-
sponsibility of the spirit to the stern demands of
the flesh, would rebel against their hateful oppres-
sion. Overcome by sense of need for complete
union with God, it would desert the physical uni-
verse, to satisfy its aspiration through soporific
musing upon an ineffable divinity. It would negate
all relations of experience except those consecrated
specifically by Absolute Being. Once more, in its
intense anxiety to safeguard its pure Deity, it would
extrude the 'One' from nature and, having de-
personalized mankind, would reach reality in a
'Beyond' where its possible degrees had all vanished.
"The soul must sink in the Divine Darkness, into
the secret place of the Divine Abyss," as Tauler
held. "There is no safety save in the Abyss," as
Brifonnet taught. "Adventitious reward may come
in the consciousness of having conquered evil and
done good; but true reward, essential reward, is
only in the wild waste and deep abyss of inscrutable
Deity, in the union of the soul with sheer imper-
sonal Godhead," as Suso preached. And, when
a believer seeks to know concerning this 'Abyss,'
"he must be as one dead, he must see neither dis-
tinction nor difference. For all that is in the God-
head is absolutely one, and formless, and void, and
292 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
interminable, and passive." So, brooding over
the 'Abyss,' Master Eckhart, that mystic of mystics,
affirmed: ''Thereof we cannot speak. It is the
simplest essence of existence, it is unknown, and must
ever be unknown. It is the simple darkness of
the silent waste. It is the utmost term." What-
ever may be said, by philosophical or theological
criticism, for or against these gyrations of ecstatic
piety, they are at plain odds with anything like our
common Christianity, which, following the evangelist,
insists upon the practical character of religion. "If
any man will to do his will, he shall know the doctrine,
whether it be of God, or whether I speak of myself." ^
As a practical scheme of salvation, mysticism failed-
He who must toil in order that those who depend
upon him may live, is undoubtedly the subject of
unrest, assuredly experiences the frequent pressure
of defect, and realizes the need for its removal.
But how can he devote himself to the contemplation
requisite? Set, as he is, amid certain social con-
ditions, how is he, while performing his duty tow-
ards man, to work out his justification with God?
Mysticism offers no answer, nay, dispels every hope
of reply. For the worldly career, even in the ten-
derest aspects and holiest duties, is a continual
* John vii. 17.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 293
defection from deity. Religion is identified with
a specialized energy which beckons from obligations
towards family and friends, towards country and
humanity, back into the tiny circle of the single
soul's desire to sink down into the abyss of infinite
and indescribable non-existence. The blessing of
an ideal capable of being realized even in the lowliest
earthly tasks never so much as occurred to sys-
tematic mysticism.*
Yet, system aside, a mystic element surcharges
the penumbra of belief always. But it is not to be
interpreted as a logical construction, relapsing, like
the philosophy, into predestined vacuity, but rather
as the leit-motiv of the fiducial process. Faith
protests against the rationalistic analysis that urges
the ultimacy of mechanical judgements. To this ex-
tent it welcomes one obvious tendency of mysticism.
In so far as religion seeks, and finds, reality only
in the significance conferred upon every separate
thing by the presence of a universal being, it afiirms
a position grateful to the mystic. As it adjudges
experience, the final import of human life depends
upon unity with God. For, otherwise, the individual
fades to a meaningless spectre amid the recurrent
^ Cf. Mediceval Mysticism, in my Aspects of Pessimism, pp.
51-96.
294 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
clash of its equally meaningless fellows. Remove
the universal, and opposition rules everywhere;
cosmic intimation, dependent upon knowable in-
terrelation of particulars in a single whole, would
thus become an ironical phrase. The penumbra
of belief, accordingly, bears no witness to a God
manifest in dreams, but does intimate an elemental
spirit whose ceaseless operation conveys the sole
guarantee that any finite object can affect the last
reckoning. Evidently, the mysticism of religion
repudiates such folly as the disappearance of each
in the 'AIL' At the same time, the believer is
moved by something akin to this idea when he denies
that an earthly phenomenon possesses self-sustained
stability, and afhrms that, as we ascend the scale
of existence from nebula to man, God reveals him-
self in a growing and more adequate revelation,
whose intercourse furnishes whatever truth the
cooperant stages evince. This apart, religion could
not achieve its most tranquillizing consolation —
the assurance that God confers inalienable reality
upon men here and now. All representatives of
religious genius have been forward to confirm
this faith. And, I think, we must recognize their
veracity to their own experience, just as we accept
that of the naturalist or historian to his. Nay,
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 295
the point can be pressed farther. We are bound
to insist upon our responsibility to the conclusions
of science and history, because they, too, partake
in the quality of revelation. They grip mankind,
and exercise sway, in proportion as they cease to
traffic with pale abstractions, and concentrate upon
affairs that form irreducible elements of events
through which experients have actually passed.
Suffused with the warm atmosphere of human
devotion, they serve and ennoble the race, because
they dignify aspects of life by justifying their reality
in degree. The penumbra surrounds them after
their kind, in that they
"Have each his own peculiar faculty,
Heaven's gift, a sense that fits them to perceive
Objects unseen before."
Similarly, religion certifies a new dimension. And,
even though the mystic note ring louder here, we are
committed to heed those whose ears hear it, just
as much as we accept personal evidence for other
exploits of experience. Indeed, contemporary
thought confronts no more clamant problem than to
state and enforce this mutual recognition among
the various activities through which, as a matter
of empirical record, men live concretely. If re-
296 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
ligion be mystic beyond all others in its fetch of
imaginative creation, still, like scientific and his-
torical enquiry, it forms one expression, among
many, of the selfsame consciousness. If it prize
direct emotion more than the clarified intellectualism
of the ages, the truth remains that, for us at least,
such emotion would have been impossible, lacking
the reason. Each must lay its gift on the altar of
the other. Besides, the mystical element in the
penumbra of belief, so characteristic of religion, is
attested by its practical results. A poor starveling
of humanity crawls forth to beg bread, and scrambles
eagerly for crumbs from the board di the prophets
— very minor prophets often. But, let the mystic
touch transmute him — he developes a personality
of his own at once, and yet in such detachment
from self that his very presence induces others to
walk the more excellent way. He attains sub-
stantive selfhood by touching the springs of life in
his neighbours; for he bears good news of a power
that has rescued him from petty aims, and liberated
in him that capacity to uplift which never appears
till a man is recreated in the decisive choice of the
eternal as against the temporal. I thank God I
have been able to commune with this transfiguration
in the persons of several who were my friends. For
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 297
the experience proves, not merely that this uni-
versalizing of the individual is religious mysticism,
but — what is incalculably more important — that
it is also soberest fact. In its practical effects it
bars the way, demanding that we settle its account
as adequately as the others. In short, human
nature shows more things than are dreamt of in
the circumspect deliverances of the understanding.
It exhibits man as a perfectly new, but nevertheless
perfectly normal, being. 'Natural supernaturalism,'
the postulate and conclusion of religion, wells up
midmost our common life in no less potent measure,
to say the least, than abstract dynamics or 'causal'
historicity.
The Christian testifies that, in his experience,
this dimension of the spiritual career reveals itself,
not simply in a peculiar manner, but so as to manifest
the complete truth of the relation between God and
man in a normative fellowship. If his faith possess
the root of the matter, he is prepared to affirm that,
for him, Christ has become all that God need be for
the total justification of his higher reality. Tre-
mendous though the asseveration seem, it does not
exceed the implications of the awful solemnities
encircling our personal destiny. As far as earth
fails from heaven, our souls, in their individual
298 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
isolation, prove unequal to the 'God within/ and,
in sheer helplessness, seek some One, "nobler and
more splendid than is seen among men," ^ praying,
"carry thou our yoke." ^ The dread position could
be saved by no less bold adventure. For, "all
human culture, natural as well as spiritual," giving
the phrase its broadest sense, "hangs upon inequal-
ity of souls." ^ Two profound questions therefore
arise forthwith, and we must grapple with them
as best we can. Their difficulty, if unparalleled,
roots in the nature of the case. First, What is the
Christian conviction? Second, What are we to
think of the Christ on Whom, as Christians, we
repose our unreserved confidence?
(i) To prevent misunderstanding, it seems neces-
sary to observe at the outset that Christian conviction
must not be viewed as if it were a statement of fact
set foursquare in a few abstract propositions. Faith
preserves vitality as a process of functioning in
personal experience throughout its self-sentencing
career. If we would fathom it, we Christians are
in duty bound to revert from propositions to per-
sons. Approached thus, as a powerful influence
operative in voluntary consciousness, Christian
^ Seneca, E-p. cxv. ^ Cf. Virgil, Mn. i, 330.
^ The Seat of Authority in Religion, James Martineau, p. 319.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 299
conviction is normative primarily. How, then, are
we to interpret this? First and foremost, as a
definite attitude, yielding estimates that control
practice distinctively. To render the meaning
more definite, take science for example. It starts
with presuppositions of its own. It adopts 'natural
law' as a base-line, and proceeds to exclude con-
trary phenomena. Intractable material is omitted.
By this judicial elision a unified result ensues, cover-
ing all amenable details without exception. So the
numerous events that conform to the 'law' receive
a new dignity; they rank as 'facts' now. Yet they
are not honoured thus in their own right. They
gain value literally, because capable of conjunction
with other phenomena in the same sphere. The
' law,' that is, underlies them and, by enforcement of
homogeneit}^, elicits the import sought by the in-
vestigator. There are no degrees; everything must
descend to one level. Evidently, however, this
method throws little light upon religious conviction.
And the reason is not far to seek. In a scientific
conspectus, all phenomena falling within the pur-
view rank equal ; no event can enjoy more value than
another. But this never applies in religion. Con-
viction selects one factor deliberately, and enthrones
it in experience. It becomes regulative, not simply
300 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
in the possession of supreme value, but in that the
value of other events is no more than derivative
from the norm. As they rise to it, so they acquire
reality. They ought to be as it is already. In other
words, Christian conviction ejects an ideal, renders
it prescriptive, and takes no pains to equate it with
this or that transient episode. It may make light
matters grave, and grave matters light. In short,
a conviction is normative primarily, because it
erects a canon of judgement, and condemns all al-
leged facts till they change their nature as it directs.
It does not confuse notoriety with greatness, unctu-
ous profession with saintliness, popularity with
permanent achievement. The breathless interest
converges, not upon the discovery of uniformities,
but upon discrimination between the standard of
value characteristic of the conviction and the affairs
it enables the believer to estimate as worthy or un-
worthy. That is to say, a conviction rises to nor-
mative sway when it predominates as a rule of life,
or rather, as a measure of the relative importance
of factors common to life. The judgement affects
degrees of validity, is not concerned with descriptive
accuracy.
So, Christian conviction may be said to overturn
many worldly estimates of ordinary things, for it
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 30I
denies that the value, attributed from other points
of view, represents the true value. As Christians,
we will (or choose) to weigh things temporal accord-
ing to the dictates of our belief. We transfigure
often, abolish sometimes, sure always that our
criterion embodies jubilant truth. Or, stating the
case otherwise, a single positive ideal sets the per-
spective, and casts its own lights and shadows into
the farthest recesses. Possessed by it, we adjudge
the reality of our nature to consist in a definite
self-activity whereby we universalize manhood in
persons puny otherwise. It contains the sole wisdom
of life in the sense that it alone mediates the satis-
faction demanded by men. Thus, for religion, but
a single ' fact ' exists ; phenomena never rank equally
on the same plane as with science. The terms of
experience fill their places, no doubt, yet in such a
way that existence itself can never be demonstrated
fully even by summation of all its parts. A unity
imderlies and alters them. The conviction accord-
ingly transcends incidental circumstances and, as
the dominant regulative command set over them,
assigns them their values in measure. A normative
ideal, therefore, offers scope for the complete and
free development of the deepest insights. Its
manifestation is constant and ubiquitous — the
302 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
little leaven that leaveneth the whole lump. The
succession of events, described as 'history,' may
subserve uses in illustrating its operation, but tells
nothing about the problem of ultimate validity.
Thus Christian conviction assumes most definite
guise in the form of an immanent process of greater
or lesser virtue for the upbuilding of religious man-
liness. It might be defined as a determination of
the life within a life. It persists as incarnate in men,
they persist as they incarnate it.
But, secondly, What is this norm? It originates
in the great dualism of self-consciousness — the
contrast, even conflict, between an inner and
an outer world. Confronted with the difference,
Christians affirm that, as between these two, human
beings, thanks to their very constitution, must seek
truth in the inward part. Here we encounter a
permanent distinction between 'grasp' and 'reach,'
between 'is' and 'will to be.' Religious aspiration
prefigures a richer, purer, completer selfhood, and
commands us to take service with it. Moreover,
in proportion as we gain acute awareness of its
internal presence, we increase that tension of the
whole being which I have termed religion. De-
votion to this upper dimension of reality motivates
the spiritual life. Messages concerning its nature
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 303
emerge from it in the revelations of religious genius.
A central authority, superior to all contrasts, seizes
upon us and, as its exponents, we acquire significance
altogether beyond our circumscribed ego. Our
final value inheres in, as well as issues from, this
penumbral power, and so we pierce through the
temporal order, as participants in a larger existence,
"without father, without mother, without descent,
having neither beginning of days, nor end of life." ^
The old dimensions of past and future, of breadth
and thickness, lose importance. And with what a
curious result ! Straightway we convict ourselves
of sin. In his pulsating experience, the Christian
is gripped by the swirl of a disturbance that may
carry down no less than up.
"Er braucht's allein
Nur thierischer als jedes Thier zu seyn."
But the frightful possibility of descent discloses also
the power of the normative ideal to capture the
whole person. And so the appeal to a redemptive
presence, able to save to the uttermost, attains poig-
nant fervour. Alienation from an unseen Reality
more potent than self — awesome in its intimacy
beyond the most terrifying forces of nature —
^ Hebrews vii. 3.
304 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
suggests, not merely its competence to mould every-
thing to its own ends, but capacity to approach /row
within y and in friendly mien. Personal communion
with the ripest actuality in our own souls works de-
liverance from their lowest impulses which, thus
touched, display their dire ugliness.
"Those who inflict must suffer, for they see
The work of their own hearts, and that must be
Our chastisement or recompense."
A new judgement governs here, of such a kind that
man comes to be the subject of a universalizing con-
sciousness pervasive of every cranny in his character.
Thus, he presents meaning just in proportion to his
apprehension by it. Convinced of an implicit rest in
God, the Christian proceeds to realize it explicitly
in his daily walk. The homely becomes lovely, be-
cause love wills perfection in it, a perfection drawn
from the object of its devotion. In brief. Christian
conviction declares God to be the normative content
of human life. No doubt every ethical religion be-
friends this conclusion in degree. But, so far as I
am aware, Christianity alone has exercised boldness
to assert that the ideal order finds its most complete
manifestation in and through our race. Paradox of
paradoxes though it be, Christians maintain stoutly
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 305
the affirmative reply to the question put so pointedly,
in another connexion, by one who is perhaps their
greatest poet, —
"can he use the same
With straitened habits and with tastes starved small,
And take at once to his impoverished brain
The sudden element that changes all things,
That sets the undreamed-of rapture at his hand,
And puts the old cheap joy in the scorned dust?" ^
No doubt, sometimes, as the poet continues, —
"All prudent counsel as to what befits
The golden mean, is lost on such an one:
The man's fantastic will is the man's law."
Nevertheless, the conviction of "the sudden ele-
ment," once felt, ranks foremost among ''the oracles
of vital deity." Accordingly, Christian faith teaches
that temporal personality takes its place, not as a
lonely subject entertaining belief about God, but
as the veritable exhibition of a present eternal in the
only form capable of being grasped by man — his
own. Universality, always potential in self-con-
scious individuals, rises to manifestation in them when
they enter spiritualized manhood. "Not my will
but Thine be done;" when one can say and enact
this, he is human indeed, but also more. He achieves
^ Browning, in An Epistle, 1. 231 f.
X
3o6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
the same mind as the eternal, wills in godlike style.
He confesses allegiance, not to an unknowable
power without the order of experience, but to a sem-
piternal presence of the Most High to his will, that
enables him to bring forth the bread of life for the
nourishment of others. The truth of this God within
the soul can be substantiated only by those whom it
has transfigured so that they enlighten the world.
Christian conviction, then, affirms a normative
''maximizing of life," possible solely through the
rush of a mystic effusion that produces the transitive
originality wherein one unfetters himself, and elevates
his disposition beyond immediate or finite interests.
But this implies, thirdly, that Christian con-
viction estimates the norm of man's being in terms
of eternity — an allegation so preposterous that to
many objectors it is inconceivable, so they say.
Let us look at it for a moment. The question would
seem to be, Can any interpretation be put upon the
presence of eternity, or an eternal element, to human
experience such that even faith, let alone reason, may
compass some account of it? Christian conviction
appears to me to require nothing less. And, clearly
enough, the answer depends upon the meaning one
assigns to 'eternity.' If it be convertible with mere
endlessness, as is commonly supposed, and urged even
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 307
by Christians, the enquiry may be dismissed forthwith.
If this embody what we Christians believe, we may
as well halt at once — for it can import nothing.
Obviously, even the more conventional doctrine of
'immortality' does not insist upon simple length of
days; it posits invariably a certain kind of being.
I take it, therefore, that Christian conviction throws
its stress, not upon a more or less babbling continu-
ance, but upon a concrete existence expressible in
experiential terms. And existence, once more, can
scarcely be predicated of 'laws,' 'propositions,'
'principles,' and so on. It is an indefinable condi-
tion peculiar to things and persons in time. In
time — "aye, there's the rub." Theologians have
intensified the difficulty of the problem unduly in
their anxiety to ' prove ' the reality of God's existence.
They have set this in apposition to the existence of
events in time, an unreal existence, they assert. We
may dismiss this procedure as irrelevant to practical
conviction. Every lover thrills to the reality of the
object of his affection ; every artist to the reality of
beauty, and so forth. Moreover, these occur in
time. But this fails to negate eternal existence,
because a fact in time, and eternal existence, though
far from identical, may be related. In short, Chris-
tianity countenances no such ascetic separations.
3o8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
What Christians affirm is that, fundamentally,
all existence, which enjoys symptomatic reality,
must be eternal existence, or existence in and to an
eternal. That is, it derives its right to weigh in the
reckoning from an eternal factor functioning in it
now; the timeless whole confers reality upon the
temporal parts. This implies, once more, that what
we call 'time' is an illusion of our individual, as
distinct from our universal, nature. We obtain
partial glimpses through sense, but fall short of
ultimate existence as it is actually. Here we evi-
dently come upon a figure of speech, a poetic state-
ment ejected by imaginative creation, a 'way of
putting it.' And in this Christian conviction cannot
find rest; that is, its complete implication must
travel farther. Personally, I feel sure that it does.
It means to assert that the value of things, and most
emphatically of men, determines itself by their in-
difference to the transient details of experience, nega-
tively, and positively, by their subordination to pur-
poses believed to be divinely inspired. This inti-
mates plainly that an adequate realization of the eter-
nal ideal may eventuate within human character.^
^ A view closely akin to this has been elaborated by the most
eminent theologian of our communion, Dr. W. P. Du Bose, in his
The Gospel in the Gospels; cf. chaps, vi, vii, and viii.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 309
The gospel of a divine humanity would constitute
such an event. Moreover, if this consummation
were to overtake our kind, it could never have
begun, and can never end — for an eternal abides
without these temporal distinctions. Besides its
apparition would not cancel or remove mistaken
judgements of value still operative with men as a
result of their sensuous envelope. The mirage of
the world would flourish still, full of loveliness to the
eye, although the spirit knew it for a deceptive show.
In short. Christian conviction points to an eternal
existence consisting in a certain quality of being,
without specific reference to time past or present,
possibly without reference to time future. So far
as a detached object succumbs to temporal bonds, it
misses completion, and must be delivered somehow
from this servitude, no matter how inevitable it may
seem. Hence Christians represent their eternity as
a way of life, consummated ''from before all worlds,"
but also as something to he consummated in them —
because fallen individuals — in an eternity to come.
Their regnant belief insists that the one, free from
temporal illusion, must save from the temporal
illusions which the other cannot escape. So it may
be said in passing that, if Christianity offer a problem
to philosophy, it is not the trumpery puzzle of end-
3IO MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
lessness, but the extremely subtle question of the
relation between imperfection in a time-series, and
another kind of existence, to be extricated from this,
in freedom from the defects that time prescribes.
^ Our religion permeates us, accordingly, because it
lends us faith to comprehend that we enjoy normative
fellowship with the eternal even amid the appear-
ances of time, and that, their vagaries overpassed,
we shall become our true selves completely, because
so unified with this eternal as to be incapable of
estrangement from it. It teaches us to believe also
that this intimate communion with the eternal has
been realized within human experience, thanks to
the spiritual clarity of one whose religious wisdom
temporal disorders, at their crudest, could not ob-
scure. Thus we feel settled in the faith that our lot
holds no ultimate hope unless the episodes of time be
rendered means of consecration to an eternal; and
that this consecration is in Christ, may be in the
spirit of any Christian convert, must so be for him in
the state where he sees face to face. Now all this is
quintessential idealism. You cannot * prove 'it by
reference to external things, or by appeal to the literal
record of a dead past. ''Thou, God, seest me!"
No one can fathom this confession who lacks ac-
quaintance with it from the inside. If one under-
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 31I
stand it, he rests his case upon a vital experience of a
power that changes will and emotion so that they
win intellect over to a new range of values ; if not,
he remains ignorant, as Christianity judges. For the
seer, the eternal constitutes the timeless end of the
personal ; and a person is personal because his seed
from the eternal renders him such. As Carlyle
says, ''the situation that has not its ideal was never
yet occupied by man . . . the ideal is in thyself."
Seize it, be seized of it, and the vision of your true
worth becomes the normal fact of common day.
Christendom has supplied many careers in point.
This humiliation of God to their nature crowned
them with the only immortality whereof man has
assurance.
Christian conviction, then, presents at least three
elements. First, it is normative, in that it erects a
standard of value whereby it rates the religious
worth of every event incident to life. Secondly, this
standard pivots upon an ideal present to the inner
vision. Thirdly, this presence is conceived as the
witness of our eternity, when, having freed ourselves,
through its efhcacy, from the thrall of time and sense,
we come to realize that only in the dimension of the
spirit can men flourish so as to accomplish work
destined to deathlessness. So far^I have tried to
312 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
describe the indescribable. For Faith lives in
radiant joy; set it to think, and it shivers in the
unaccustomed atmosphere, with woe-begone gestures
that seem eccentric or mayhap foolish.
(2) Hence, when the Christian proceeds to confer
substantial rather than verbal embodiment upon his
faith, he turns forthwith to Christ. And the ques-
tion arises. What are we to think of Christ, or
rather. To what do we testify when we declare that,
in Him, the fundamental elements material to this
conviction reach supreme expression?
You must understand, to begin with, that the
profoundest thinkers and holiest saints of Christen-
dom have recurred to this problem continually —
to confess failure. It would be gross presumption
on my part were I to suppose that, without a tithe of
their ability, learning, and spiritual enrichment, I
could succeed where they have found themselves
baffled. The truth seems to be that the problem
eludes operose solutions; anyway, it mocks pure
intellect. I cannot attempt more than an indication
of my manner of approach to it. Here, too, my
narrow limits confine me to the barest suggestions.
It may conduce to clearness if I cite three current
views with w^hich I find myself unable to agree.
Some devoted and devout students of Christianity,
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 313
who form an influential school just now, teach that,
after it had passed from Palestine into the Roman
Empire, our religion was vitiated by adoption of
ideas and tendencies peculiar to Greek thought.
Accordingly, they have raised the cry, 'Back to
history,' and have laboured to arrive at intimate
relations with the Jesus of the Gospels by going
behind these pagan accretions. Careful use of this
method may result, assuredly, in a more definite,
because less doctrinal, conception of our Lord's
teaching. But, while it would be sheer ingratitude
to lightlie these investigations and their important
consequences, it is quite another affair to train with
their representatives when they insist that in this
manner, and in none other, can we answer the
question, "What think ye of Christ?" Valuable
as a historical discipline, the critico-psychological
method seems to me to err in two particulars. On
the one hand, its estimate of its own possibilities is
too optimistic. As we have seen, we know little
about the biography of the earthly Jesus, so little
that we cannot hope to reach the eternal Christ even
by most minute study of the New Testament accounts.
Christianity persists in all that Christ continues to
be, far rather than in what the man Jesus did during
the recorded fragment of his temporal career. The
314 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
fulness of the personality transcends our most ac-
curate determinations of the teaching as reported by
disciples. We may, indeed, recover something of the
individual verisimilitude, here a little, there a little.
Some portions of the story may turn out historical
indisputably, others — probably a larger total — may
have to be rejected as fictitious, and still others may
prove an admixture of history and imagination, so
closely interwoven that separation is impracticable
now. But, in any case, the universality present to
the living Person escapes this process; happily it
neither needs, nor can submit to, any such recovery.
It abides intrinsic to the mystic penumbra of Chris-
tian faith. Criticism might very well regain for us
some of the traits peculiar to Jesus as he walked in
the flesh. But it does not thereby acquire exclusive
patent to uncover the ideal Christ, Whose contingent
symptoms these traits were. So, on the other hand,
the critico-psychological method is too pessimistic
in its estimate of the actualities — too barren, ana-
lytic, oblivious of the constructive response induced
in the regeneration of Christian men. One incident,
more or less, would aid our vital Christianity scarce
a whit. The doings of Jesus are wrapped in ob-
scurity — and this is far better. His teaching we
know in sufficient measure from the tenour of the
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 315
documentary sources. But the metahistorical Per-
son, as it governs down the ages, we can learn only
from those whom He assimilated to himself. This
should be obvious to anyone who has tried to com-
mune with the early disciples. They at least sensed
the universal in Christ by help of some other witness
than companionship with the man of Nazareth.
For my part, I am ready to accept this single fact
as decisive against critical agnosticism.
Once more, nothing could be less helpful for our
problem than the widespread, semi-popular rational-
ism that sees in the Life of Christianity no more than
another Socrates, Marcus Aurelius, or Spinoza — a
remarkable moralist. This construction 'explains*
Christianity by the familiar expedient of omitting
nigh all that originates the need for explanation. For
Christianity consists, not in a school of thought, even
an ethical school, but in Christ's power to reproduce
Himself in any man. His way of life contains the
condensed secret, and formulates the principle of
solution. He guaranteed, and continues to guarantee,
a relation of the individual disposition to God un-
exampled elsewhere, and capable of 'proof only as
brought to fresh illustration in Christian characters.
Morality forms but one of many events contingent
to it, and meets transfiguration like the rest.
3l6 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Finally, if the rationalistic conception be a parody
because extracted from a chip, the vague humani-
tarian notion, still prevalent in some quarters, is
just as lopsided. A generalized sentimentalism,
wherever human interests are concerned, falls short
sadly of Christ's plangent idealism. The yearning for
man's temporal satisfaction, daily comfort or decency,
and natural pleasure, does indeed accompany the gen-
uine Christian attitude. But it issues from something
far other — from a conviction concerning man's rela-
tion to God. This saves it from flabby benevolence,
from green-sick gush, from the cant of vapid enthu-
siasm. These methods of approach, then, in their fe-
cund kinds, seem to me failures, because they are too
relative, too doctrinaire as of an age, too forgetful of the
transitive, reproductive universalism that is Christ.
If so, what are we to say? My own feeling — for
it is a matter of emotion and wish rather than of
intellect — may be hinted if I confess that, when
faith flags, and doubts invest, I turn, not to the
Synoptists, winsome though they be, not to Paul,
although his matchless courage and magnificent
self-devotion overwhelm one with shame, but to
what I have called the pearl of great price in the
New Testament — the Fourth Gospel.^ The eternal
^ See above, p. 151.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 317
Christ is true man — man reborn after the spirit, "by
a new and living way, which he hath consecrated for
us, through the veil, that is to say, his flesh," as the
writer of Hebrews saw.* For us, in these latter days,
at all events, the essential qualitative truth receives
sufficient emphasis in the memorable admonition to
Thomas: "Because thou hast seen me, thou hast
believed: blessed are they that have not seen, and
yet have believed."^ What do we believe, then?
Let Paul answer for us, and in his Johannine mood.
"The righteousness which is of faith speaketh on
this wise. Say not in thine heart, Who shall ascend
into heaven? (that is, to bring Christ down from
above :) Or, Who shall descend into the deep ? (that
is, to bring up Christ again from the dead.) But
what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy
mouth, and in thy heart : that is, the word of faith,
which we preach." ^
Be assured, Christ cannot conserve His reality for
us, and continue no more than Jesus of Nazareth,
crucified, dead, buried. He persists as the active
presence that operates within, soul to soul, or^we
have lost Him beyond hope of recovery. For the
Christian, human life on this infinitesimal planet is
either a quantitative phantasmagoria, or is capable
^ X. 20. ^ John XX. 29. ^ Romans x. 6-8.
3l8 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of being charged with awful responsibility as the
fullest theophany patent in time, destined, moreover,
to perfect completion through a divine humanity
realizing itself untrammelled in the kingdom of God.
And this divine humanity is achieved without flaw,
once for all, by and through Christ.
The curious fancy has overtaken me often that, if
we compare the Synoptists with John, they seem to
be predecessors of Christ, he the veritable follower.
The last verse of the Fourth Gospel indicates why.
"And there are also many other things which Jesus
did, the which, if they should be written every one,
I suppose that even the world itself could not contain
the books that should be written." The factual
element in the earlier writers smacks of struggle, bows
to local pressure, may be overset even ; the personal
touch of the later disciple flashes forth iridescent
with flaming truth. John in foreign Ephesus, or his
near kith, interprets the Person of the Master as
universal life ; he makes it the prius of the possibilities
of a history that would spell cold prose otherwise.
He attests it as precedent, primary, and reduces the
biographical record to illustrative rank. His ap-
proach, that is, issues from the enthusiasm of trans-
muted individual experience. Or, the actual pres-
ence of God — the eternal — in Christ conditions
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 319
the effort to comprehend the man Jesus. A meta-
historical person, uplifted and ubiquitous, creates
the importance attributable to a single Jew in time.
The author of the Fourth Gospel has been seized
of the conviction that Christ cannot be understood
by any appeal to variable circumstances, and that
these must be interpreted by reference to the im-
pulsive power of the eternal existence shining through
them. Completion of humanity prevails with him,
not as a philosophical idea, not as a particular event
accidental to a place or period, but as the internal
organization of constructive efflorescence, always real
and always regenerating. ''What things soever"
the Father "doeth, these the Son also doeth in like
manner y ^ Here we have the Johannine approach;
the believer adds to the record, now stereotyped and
therefore chilly, his warmth of passionate devotion,
and passes thereby from a historical one among others
to a metahistorical, renewing force, incarnate finally
in manhood. He assimilates himself to Christ, and
in this assimilation the witness of the eternal, ener-
gizing personality becomes self-evident. In a word,
Christ achieves place as divine through the conse-
cration of His followers. The inexhaustible fresh-
ness it is that supplements the partial tale of the life
^ John V. 19, R.V.
320 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
on earth, and acknowledges therein a life from
heaven.
This universality of Christ, in the concrete faith of
His disciples who had not seen, solves the apparently
insoluble problem of a God-man walking in Galilee
of Judea. The agnosticism which alleges that the
Prologue of the Fourth Gospel ''is not the key to
its comprehension," ^ contrives precisely to invert
the situation. One suspects it for a mere foible of
scholastic thinking. By his cosmic presence, in the
exhibition of a redemptive and ubiquitous life in
human kind, Jesus served himself Christ; but this,
the ordained end, could not become apparent till
believers, having perceived the Christ in and for
themselves, developed ability to recognize what a
universal and eternal existence might purport.
This, the completion of Jesus' work, necessarily
eventuated ere his divinity, as man's Christ, could
enter the human spirit in triumphant victory. The
validity of Christ, that is, broke forth from the ' One
God' creative of history, not from any annalistic
statement within history. Christ appeared in final
reality, not during the period when "hitherto ye
have asked nothing in my name," but when the
^ A. Harnack, in d. Ztschr.f. Theol. u. Kirche, vol. ii, pp. 189 f.
Cf. History of Dogma, vol. i, chap, ii, sects. 2r^'
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 32 1
saying was proven, "Ask, and ye shall receive, that
your joy may be full." ^ The Master evinced
'heavenly' (that is, universal or eternal) value,
through the mystic facts evidential of His career
after death in the souls of His servants. Here, at
length, man discovered Him as the God within the
soul, mighty to save. Thus, and thus only, it
became apparent that no antithesis exists be-
tween God and man, but a perfect indwelling of
the eternal in the temporal. Thus, too, Jesus
passed over into the Son of God — the Christ with
us. For, as Keim says, with penetrating insight,
"He has filled up the gulf between the One and
the Many which Moses dug and no prophet bridged
over." ^
Unquestionably, this estimate of all that Christ
is approves itself primarily to Christian piety. But
it was never meant to accomplish aught else, hence
the secret of missionary zeal. We are not saved by
an opus operatum, or by a speculative genius, or by
a hero, or by a demigod, but by the reproduction in
us, according to our own original effort, of the spirit-
ual manhood which Christ conveyed. Not that He
needs anything at our unclean hands; nevertheless,
our communion offers the only present certification
^ John xvi. 24. ^ Jesus of Nazara, vol. vi, p. 429.
Y
322 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
of His transcendent potency. It seals the eternal in
Him. "Know ye not that ye are the temple of God
and that the spirit of God dwelleth in you?" ^
We do know, and this knowledge it is that approves
the largest indwelling of the Spirit of God in the
deepest convictions of Christians. Only to children
of the flesh can incarnation intimate anything. With
them it happens to be a normal event; in Christ
they discern the full-throated message for which this
event came into being, without which it goes to pieces
as the most intolerable error perpetrated by heedless
cosmic Fate. And so, for the Christian, through his
transformed personal experience, Christ is "alive
for evermore" ^ as the explicit manifestation of the
normative presence of the divine nature — a nature
implicit in man, if man is to be reckoned as a being
who possesses any differentiating mark of his very
own.
And the attestation? Any believer can furnish
it. If Jeremiah could declare, "His word was in
mine heart as a burning fire shut up in my bones, and
I was weary with forbearing, and I could not stay," ^
how much more he who has made common cause
with a 'Comrade-God,' a familiar among the sons of
men. A human God was our imperative necessity.
* I Corinthians iii. i6. ^ Revelation i. i8. ^ xx. 9.
THE PENUMBRA OF BELIEF 323
From the plenitude of His nature, "touched in
all things like as we are," our emptiness could
be filled. Mystic though the penumbra of this
faith be, it intimates the basal truth concerning
our divided life. ''For this cause came I unto this
hour." '
^ John xii. 27.
LECTURE VIII
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING
Readers of the Old Testament will recall that the
Chronicler relates a curious story, not told elsewhere,
about a wonderful victory gained by Jehoshaphat,
son of Asa, over the ^' children of Ammon, Moab, and
mount Seir," although, at first, the king had been
"dismayed by reason of this great multitude." ^
Success won, the Judeans ''assembled themselves in
the valley of Berachah: for there they blessed the
Lord." Like them^ we have found few substantial
reasons to fear the dangers that seem to compass
religion in these days. But, like them too, we must
remember that the valley is no mountain top where
we may dwell safely in serene disregard of the en-
circling world. Christianity, as Religion, may indeed
bless. Nevertheless, we are fated to fare forth to
our daily labours, and to meet many perplexities on
their own chosen ground. Our faith will not avail
us much if we fail to employ it actively, and this
^ Cf. 2 Chronicles xx. 1-30.
324
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 325
without taking unfair advantage of bare conventions.
Culture presses forward, developing new situations,
raising fresh issues, and we hinder rather than help
Christianity by reluctance to meet the onset of varia-
tion. Thus, in order to round out our enquiry, we
had better confront several obvious difficulties. They
are of a more or less practical kind, and often give
the enemy occasion to scoff. Belief or no belief,
we work midmost modern life and, despite wishes,
are unable to comport ourselves as if we were con-
temporaries of Paul, of Augustine, of Baxter, of
Pearson, of Butler, of Keble, or even of Brooks. We
need imagination to recognize that we stand account-
able as much for our good as for our bad deeds.
In some ways, moreover, the stress of the good may
prove no less severe than that of the evil. For light
and shade blend here below. As Nietzsche said,
" unf athomably shrewd is the stupidity of the good :"
"myself I sacrifice unto my love, and my neighbour
as myself."
First, then, if, as we have tried to see, Christianity
represent the true central stream of religion, if, as
some claim, it be the ' absolute ' religion, Why has it
failed, and failed conspicuously, to master the human
race? The deepest shadows of the valley envelope
us when we face this sullen fact. But there it stands,
326 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
leering at our bright hopes, giving the lie to our fond
assurances. Of course, figures are deceptive, and fur-
nish no more than an approximation. Agreed that
the various faiths of the world count 1,540,000,00 ad-
herents, Christianity in its many branches numbers
but a fraction more than thirty-three per cent —
520,000,000. Even more startling is the situation
in the British Empire, where Christianity occupies
the third place. Of King Edward's subjects,
206,000,000 profess Hinduism, 75,000,000 Moham-
medanism, 60,000,000 Christianity.^ In other words,
our religion has made little impression upon Asia,
the mother of immemorial civilizations, the birth-
place of the ethnic faiths regnant now, the home
of 900,000,000 men. Moreover, to-day Islam rules
the land which Jesus illuminated, the scenes of
Paul's principal labours, the age-old empire where
the greatest thinkers of early Christianity held sway,
the places where Augustine met his epoch-making
experiences, and its political metropolis was the
capital of the first Christian emperor. It attaches
Asia at the rate of from 25,000 to 50,000 converts
per year, — perhaps many more, as some authorities
^ Cf. Comparative Religion, its Genesis and Growth, Louis
Henry Jordan, p. 573 f. I happen to know from an independent
source that Mr. Jordan has taken the greatest pains to verify his
figures.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 327
declare. Further, in Africa, it has seized upon the
north, upon the vast districts of the Upper Niger
and Upper Senegal, has spread south far down the
east coast, and gains steadily along the Atlantic
fringe; so much so, that one-half of the continent is
Moslem; two-thirds feel Mohammedan influences;
thirty-six per cent of the population profess Islam;
while, Copts and Abyssinians aside, Christianity
must rest content with less than three per cent.
Nor does the account close here. One would antici-
pate great success for Christianity in Hindustan,
where the pax hritannica affords protection and
favourable auspices. Nevertheless, the British have
not divined the inner character of their Indian sub-
jects, especially on the religious side, and, as a con-
sequence, Christianity has secured no grip, save in
the Madras province of Tinnevelli, where 150,000 of
the 2,900,000 Christians resident in India are to be
found.^ It suffices nothing to cast all this in the
teeth of missionaries as a class. For, on the whole,
^ An apparent exception to this may be found in Malabar,
where more than one-fifth (571,000) of Indian native Christians
are to be found. The legend is that Christianity was introduced
here by St. Thomas. However this may be, it is undoubtedly
ancient (sixth century, perhaps), and stands aside from modern
missionary activity. Cf. The Indian Christians of St. Thomas,
W. J. Richards.
328 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
they are staunch to their profession, work devotedly,
often amid most discouraging difficulties and, in
India at least, have won respect, if not complete
confidence, from every class. Black sheep appear
amongst them, as is inevitable. But their very
rarity excites vivid attention, and thus acquires
importance out of proportion to ratio.
Anyone who has considered the subject without
prejudice, and reviewed the astonishing figures, will
tell you to seek the causes deeper. It is no part of
my intention to discuss them now, for I am leading
up to a larger question, as you will see directly. But
I riiay indicate one or two points.
For instance, why should a religion of Asiatic
origin miss appeal to Asiatics so thoroughly ? ^ The
result is the more remarkable when one acknow-
ledges that, beyond all men, Asiatics delight in
religion, and evince extraordinary capacity for con-
centration upon things of the spirit. Well, every
religion must express itself in what may be termed a
polity. And, if Christianity drew its original impulse
from Asia, its polity is Occidental through and
through. As a consequence, it carries this polity
with it in the persons of its representatives wherev^i^'
^ Cf. The Naturalization of Christianity in the Far East,
Edward C. Moore, Harvard Journal of Theology, vol. i, no. 3.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 329
it penetrates. One laughs aloud as he considers the
feelings of a high-caste Hindu Pundit, who is asked
to walk lock-step with a respectable bourgeois Eng-
lishman, or a conventional middle-class American, in
order that he may participate fully in the blessing of
a higher religion ! The Hindu deems our civilization
folly; nevertheless, we would have him 'civilized'
after our fashion as a necessary accompaniment of
christianization. We try to teach him the English
language, to introduce him to English literature,
to inoculate him with ' Anglo-Saxon ' manners, to fill
his head with Occidental science, — in short, we
would have him turn his back upon his own ancient
culture, so that he might hold up his head within
the fair precincts of our faith. Needless to say,
fatuity could go no farther. The riddle reads plain
enough, — if there is to be Asiatic Christianity, it
must come through Asiatics, Arab Christianity
through Arabs, Negro Christianity through Negroes.
We shall have to drop the futile task of cutting alien
civilizations to our pattern as the prelude to religious
conversion, and proceed to devise plans for their
transformation from within by their own folk. And
why? Take the first case.
An impassable barrier still separates Oriental
from Occidental culture. Despite all the benefits —
330 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
and any just man knows them for legion — she has
conferred upon India, Britain has failed to lay vital
grasp upon any considerable part of the population.
In passing, the same may be said of Russia in the
East. And the middle wall of partition is as much
religious as aught else. Or, rather, it takes the shape
of religion wrought into a complex social system.
We concentrate interest upon objects in space and
time, Asiatics upon timeless ideas ; our life is individ-
ualized and secular, theirs socialized and theosophical.
The master ideals of the two culture-spheres will not
mix. Little wonder, then, that the Asiatic, proud
of his immeasurable past, dislikes Christianity, the
religion of a 'superior' people, who would disrupt
his social system, and who will not, indeed cannot,
intermarry with him or otherwise share life on terms
of intimate equality. Our religion would render
him a waif in his own land, an outcast from his kin,
would leave him naked and raw amid the only civili-
zation he knows or can appreciate.^ Need we be
surprised, then, that, if dissatisfied with obsolescent
Hinduism, shaken by our science, he joins himself to
Islam, where he finds practical equality, and not a
beauteous, verbal theory? Every thoughtful Anglo-
Indian is aware that the Asiatic would be rid of
^ Cf. Matthew xxiii. 15.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 33 1
British rule at once, not because it is bad, — its
justice Indians admit freely (and resent !), — but
because he would, above all things, return to his
old paths, would be himself, in short, and cease to
pose at the behest of disagreeable intruders. Nay,
likely enough, the dumb millions have their reasons.
The complete sterility of English education in India
were enough in itself. The system has produced
no native of first-class ability, and is responsible,
possibly, for the significant decline of Indian origi-
nality in architecture, literature, art, politics, as also
for the slow dissolution of the principal religion.
To have relegated the Pundit to the background,
and suckled the Baboo, is, indeed, a glorious achieve-
ment, calculated to arouse pride ! Did not Rome
succeed amazingly in a parallel way? Many other
things might be said, but we cannot stay. Briefly,
then, Christianity must express itself afresh, from
within the Asiatic and African civilizations, ere it
can hope to remove the huge blot upon its missionary
success. We should learn to attribute past failure
not to our religion, but to ourselves, its half-hearted
and, sometimes, thick-headed upholders.
Now this raises a far wider issue. We share the
accomplished blessing, but we are condemned to
continue in the valley of life. And the question
332 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
arises, Is Christianity, as we know it, to remain an
abiding thing, finished and adequate, or is it possible
that man must still anticipate momentous changes
within it? This problem relates primarily to what
I have called polity, and is therefore of practical
interest mainly. Accordingly, it involves another,
and theoretical, enquiry that may be put as follows :
Is the * absolute^ element in Christianity fixed and
static ? Or, on the contrary, is it in process of such
transformation that it may be overpassed some day ?
In the language of religion. Can the kingdom of God
attain more concrete expression on earth? These
issues may seem unusual, perhaps impertinent.
Yet we cannot shake them off under temporal con-
ditions. What I wish to urge is that, if Christianity
lag, we its children must bear the blame, unless we
muster courage to encounter even the most discon-
certing phenomena. ''The good are indeed saviours
of society, but only as they find its sins in them-
selves." ^ Who supposes that even the best have
exhausted the unsearchable riches of Christ?
It were superfluous to prove that religion and polity
cannot be separated. The one manifests itself in
numerous activities that would be impossible apart
from the other. Accordingly, as they interpenetrate
^ Philosophy of History, Alfred H. Lloyd, p. 228.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 333
inevitably, they interact constantly, and contribute
in common to many movements. On the other
hand, the reason for this interdependence exhibits
every sign of extreme subtlety — it has been stated
in most various and conflicting forms. I am in-
clined to believe that, in the present state of socio-
logical knowledge, a general, though not necessarily
vague, description must suffice. A religion and
(if you please) a secular polity agree in one conspic-
uous quality. They evince a formative tendency
that no contingent events serve to explain. The
controlling force in both attaches to a metahistorical
element. It attests the operation of a power that
cannot be referred to single individuals as their
attribute. It is impossible to track the state to
contingent events, or to abstract statements of belief,
any more than the church. And, all things con-
sidered, it seems possible that we know this power
best in group-life, even if, as also seems possible,
any particular group illustrates aspects of the whole,
and perhaps hides the complete verity. For example,
in the eighteenth century, many rationalistic critics
of religion were pleased to identify it with priest-
craft. It was an evil in their eyes, but not unmixed.
Bad as the ally of superstition against enlightenment,
it might be good, notwithstanding, as ''a bridle in
334 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
the mouth of the sensual mob." Jejune as these
notions appear now, they held a modicum of truth.
If, in the life of a polity, some men — the ministers of
religion, say — be set apart as the exclusive repre-
sentatives of a definite activity, then you must an-
ticipate that, from time to time, this very selection
will react upon the organization in general. Em-
phatically, the interests of the official class may
diverge seriously from those of the community, and
to such a degree as to arouse fierce antagonism.
The story of bureaucracy needs no comment. The
phrases, 'high-priests of science,' 'magnates of
finance,' 'mandarins of education,' and the like,
serve to hint that the same process operates in other
directions as well. Now this implies that, in the
differentiations necessary yet accidental to polity,
specialists are prone to forget their own origin.
Their inmost life flows from "the general." So,
if they seclude themselves or magnify their office,
they imperil their dearest hopes. The moment any
group stereotypes itself, and would limit the expres-
sion of the metahistorical principle ascetically to a
disrupted part, an artificial condition eventuates,
and conflict becomes inevitable. Needless to say,
this very thing has overtaken Christianity more
than once in the Western world, and always with
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 335
the same result. The sequel — self-confidence —
has drawn opposition, and has been forced to abate
its pretensions. One sees similar phenomena in other
grooves — in science, for instance. Compare its
present tone with that rampant a short generation
ago; the raucous note is raised no more. And the
moral would appear to be that religion, like every-
thing else, must retain intimate relations with polity
as a whole; socialization provides an essential
seed-plot. It ought to incline away from itself,
as it were, that it may enjoy, not rude health of outer
estate, but real influence through the entire ethos.
If it retire to its sacred precincts, unavoidably its
idealization of the community will fall short of a
thorough mission. Nay, things being what they
are, the presence of a complex polity to religion acts
as a defence against the conceits of archaism. The
polity might well suffer from some species of Chris-
tianity; but our hearts' desire is that it succeed by
the power of religious truth. Its very defects should
offer security for the future of a militant faith.
Besides, such is human nature that a polity forms
an indispensable instrument. For, as the philoso-
pher would put it, religion needs opposition in order
to pass through self-alienation, the painful prelude
to fitness for a fuller revelation. In our universe,
336 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
absence of growth, of power to expand, is synony-
mous with death. Religion enjoys no exemption
from this rule. If it would progress, in the sense of
maintaining positive dominion, it must keep with
society. In addition, the more it pervades communal
affairs, the more it finds ready intercourse with the
ideals and activities symptomatic of other spheres;
that is, the more ubiquitously it witnesses the pres-
ence of the metahistorical power which never be-
longs to single persons or to sectarian groups. It
is enhanced, because multiplied with other factors,
not only incidental, but needful, to its saving career.
Yet at a price. The polity develops many features
that may retard, even when they do not vitiate, the
religion. Hence a constant opposition marks the
neighbourly existence of both. Neither can dis-
pense with the other, and yet each tends to subserve
its own distinctive aim. In short, while a polity is
essential to Christianity, Christianity is not essential
to this or that polity; so the ideals of the polity and
the religion may diverge, even although alliance be
necessary to the socialized ends of both. Thus it
may be perfectly true that Christianity suits Occiden-
tal civilization, Hinduism Oriental culture, Moham-
medanism Negro society, and, at the same time, it
may be perfectly true that the ^ absoluteness' of Chris-
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 337
tianity remains una£fected. In any event, no one
can deny that many characteristics of Western polity
do antagonize our religion. And if, as some allege,
the latter stands on trial to-day, it is no less plain
that the former has reached the assize also. The
one cannot be weighed without the other. The vast
differentiations of Occidental life have resulted in
partial seclusion of religion. As a result, the two
must be brought into intimate cooperation once
more, if further advance is to ensue. The growth
of insanity and suicide, the awful ravages of alcohol-
ism, the grave failure of the most energetic classes
to reproduce themselves in due proportion, the
diffused individualism and materialism, together
with similar phenomena, indicate some practices
within the polity discrepant from the ideals of the
religion. So, too, many professing Christians are
satisfied to govern themselves by ' legal ' conscience.
They apply one standard in business, another in
the charmed circle of ' the four hundred,' another in
political ' deals,' and guide the great body of their
ordinary practice thus. Yet they know a different
rule in the church — alas, too often theoretically.
Differentiation within the polity renders them tol-
erant of smooth blackguards, of agreeable gamblers,
of mannerly sensualists, of public trustees whose
338 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
official career is a lie, the blacker for copious white-
wash. Still, on the other hand, without the polity the
religion can effect nothing. The Gospel is to the
world surely. We need to translate ' Christian truth '
into the language and deeds of daily life, in order that
its salving influence may pervade the community.
A religion effective from Monday to Saturday will
speedily expose the hoUowness of a religion paraded
on Sunday. Christianity faces a new task in relation
to contemporary civilization, and needs must adapt
itself to an unprecedented combination of circum-
stances. To renew the polity, it cannot avoid self-
renewal in some shape. It is no static system, but
an active process capable of endless recuperation.
Either this or its efficacy belongs already with the
past — not done away, indeed, but laid up in a
napkin, like a venerated fetich, to work miracles
on call.
Now, if our religion must express itself in a polity,
how can it retain its ' absoluteness ' ? On one con-
dition only: given a functional activity necessary
to the super individual existence of the polity, 'and
performed by religion. Doubtless, the subject is
obscure and difficult; in addition, students have
not probed it to the bottom so far. Accordingly,
I confine myself to a few hints. As we have
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 339
attempted to see, Christianity stresses a universal
factor in individual men. But, even as subjects of
this universalism, they live in human societies which,
again, bestow on them a secondary universalism
variable from organization to organization. As a
rule this political enlargement takes the shape of
national or imperial pride. Here religion and
polity touch. The former insists upon what I shall
call the ' person.' No one rises to the distinctive
level of personality till he betrays the presence of
some power greater than self. His consciousness
gives access to the play of a transitive force that at
once enlarges and dissolves the separate, self-regard-
ing ego. Thus man releases a loftier experience,
that betokens motivation by an operative spirit
'absent in his unregenerate days. Or, to state the
case in terms redolent of piety : ''Happy is he whom
truth by itself doth teach, not by figures and words
that pass away, but as it is in itself." Taught thus,
a human life receives consecration as a new outlet
for the manifestation of spiritual efficacy. It ceases
to be a means, and ranks as an end — for the sake
of the vital message it conveys. Accordingly, reli-
gion would conserve the individual on account of
the superindividual in him. It would save him,
because he is a ' person ' or may come to be one.
340 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
Polity, on the other hand, would conserve the indi-
vidual in relation to sociomorphism. It would value
him as a means to the preservation of its character-
istics which, after their kind, are also greater than
himself. Religion struggles for the ' person,' polity
requires the individual to struggle for it. In the one
case, man reigns as the agent of universalism, in the
other, he serves as its patient. Notice, both con-
centrate upon his psychical enlargement, but reli-
gion unconditionally, polity conditionally. Religion
treats the ' person ' as a perfectible whole, polity would
use the socialized individual as a relative part.
The two agree, then, in a common tendency to
universalize individuals. Further, religion cannot
dissociate itself from the circumstances characteris-
tic of a polity. So it would seem that, if Christianity
is to retain its 'absoluteness,' it must perform the func-
tion of transforming the ' absoluteness ' of the polity
in such a way as to show that it also subserves the
^person' as an end. In other words, it has to operate
so as to indicate that, just as the individual may be
rendered a vehicle of the universal, and be thus multi-
plied into personality, the polity, even in its super-
individualism, may be widened in like manner.
Religion can safeguard its peculiar universalism
only if it energize as a vital power permeating the
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 34I
polity throughout, and effecting tangible results
which, otherwise, the polity could not achieve of itself.
The metahistorical unity, common to religion and to
polity, attains clear manifestation in this way, and
in no other. For instance, as a matter of record,
Christianity produced modern civilization in the
Occident. It functioned so that the polity felt the
presence of a spiritual momentum such as could be
generated only within an integrated society. Yet
the society was elevated above its kind by partici-
pation in the religious idealism. For a polity is of
one blood with its diverse members in this respect, —
it can support its temporary ills, frequent disappoint-
ments, and constant strains, if it sense responsibility
to something immeasurably more august than itself.
Religion secures compliance with this condition. The
polity changes chameleon-like. But religion stands
firm witness to the metahistorical unity, no matter
how it may alter the aeonic means whereby acute
need for God is brought home to the 'secular'
group. Thus, in so far as any polity holds power
to perdure through time and chance, it has already
become a religious organization. And, in relation
to it, the function of religion is precisely to arouse
consciousness of this truth, and to keep it lively.
Need I add that, for our own civilization at least.
342 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
we have no choice ; the purpose myst be effected by
Christianity, if at all. Hence its ' absoluteness.'
Moreover, as it fills its function, it awakens our
responsibility to other civilizations, by their very
nature petitioners for the same universalism.
But, some one will say, ' the facts of political and
social life seem to prove that a polity is quite sec-
ular, that, on the slightest pretext, it apostatizes
easily, nay, completely. Christian peoples, several
of them, worship force openly. Indeed, they hold
might for right, although they may hesitate to make
the ugly confession with their lips. Again, many of
the ' directing classes,' mainstays of the church,
serve Mammon obsequiously. In a word, thanks to
your polity, Christianity seems to have gone to the
wall.' True, but not true enough. We must pause
to ask a question. What do these vexatious develop-
ments betoken? No more than this: the polity,
thanks to the severe pressure that overtakes all such
arrangements from time to time, has sacrificed its
best ideals for the sake of immediate satisfaction,
or momentary advantage. Those who worship
Might shall die by Might — or reform, lest this evil
befall them. Those who worship Mammon shall
succumb to his canker, or repudiate him, if they
would escape. Signs of these very consequences
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 343
already so multiply and alarm that we are prone to
declare, 'Occidental civilization is at the cross-roads.'
Now, if religion function as I have attempted to
show, it alone holds virtue to restore that essence
of the larger life which the polity has bartered,
misled by false values. We must always remember
that Might and Mammon are worshipped just in
so far as they can be spiritualized. Man never
bows the knee to them, but to the permanent expan-
sion of self — the benison of superindividuality —
which, as he fondly supposes, they are able to bestow.
The devil makes an invariable .appeal, he lacks
originality entirely. It is ever, "All these things
will I give thee, — the kingdoms of the world, and
the glory of them." Not the relative values of
Might and Mammon, but the absolute value, in
relation to self, of the things they offer, elicits human
allegiance. Accordingly, the clamant business of
Christianity becomes quite apparent. It must
unveil anew, even to seventy times seven, those
higher reaches of enlargement, those sources of
transfiguration from individual to 'person,' whence
alone permanent elevation issues. Granted that,
in the nature of the case, polity strays into devious
paths, follows divisive courses, the more need for
Christianity to divine its real end, and this under the
344 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
darkest clouds that shadow any moment. Even in
its Caesarism and Mammonism, the poh'ty worships
— it turns to an 'oversoul' in some sort, and detects
vaguely its birth from 'another world.' Imperfect
absolutism of this kind can be exorcised only through
the true absolutism of religion. Christianity must
open the eyes of 'commercialism,' and its numerous
kin, so that they may perceive the actual source of
the stability that guarantees them their temporary
triumphs.
The power of expansion characteristic of modern
society comes from man's ability to universalize
self. To reveal this in its ultimate nature is the
splendid task of religion, ever old, yet ever new. For,
as the ends whereto polity makes individuals the
means differ from generation to generation, so too
Christianity must needs originate fresh methods to
enforce the right of the individual to end as a ' person.'
It will preach subordination of group-ideals to ideal
manhood, it will set forth the still larger life, by
showing that adequate personalism depends upon
intimate communion, in complete sincerity of purpose,
with the Spirit of Perfection whence group-ideals
also obtain any significance they possess. Amid
the distractions of time and sense, many miss the
truth that heroism lies, not in worldly might, or in
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 345
crowding goods, but in the stern battle with self-will,
won only when self has disappeared, to return with
its solemn experiences worked out "as ever under
the great Taskmaster's eye." If, as Fontenelle
said, "our fathers made the mistake of hoarding up
errors for our benefit," the reason is evident. They
forgot the true universal, in devotion to particular and
momentary aims. And we are equally liable to the
same mischance, unless Christianity clear our vision
so that it may penetrate to the essential being of our
kind. Its plain mission, then, — and this within
the polity, — is to suffuse the secular ' absolute ' with
the ennobling glow of the eternal, that all dross may
be refined away. In other words, the polity — ours,
or the Asiatics', or what not — affords another, and
greater, opportunity to the religion. The momentous
issues with which Christianity still teems relate, not
merely to the conversion of individuals, but to the
regeneration of cultures. These things seen and
temporal, just because they fill so huge a stage, call
for more adequate 'absolutism' than we have
realized hitherto. So be we are faithful to the
gigantic trust, Christ begins His larger mission —
the polity of to-day exacts more than ever from Him.
To conquer, ' Christian truth ' must be proven truth
by us more thoroughly than by our predecessors of
346 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
olden time. For, as a polity grows more complex,
it tends to disperse the solidarity essential to its
well-being, in a mass of competing group or
individual interests. This happens to be the grave
disease of Western civilization now. On Christianity
devolves the duty of restoring the broken unity, by
its regenerating universalism. Only thus will the
polity develop those superindividual sanctions,
incarnate by transitive personalities serving the
ideal, Ihat give it internal worth sufficient to lead its
members to go to the death for it, if need be, and this
gladly. Now, as of yore, if ''there be fifty righteous
within the city," or " peradventure ten," the Lord
will ''spare the place." For by these independent
instruments, the operation of the eternal, salving
ideal is assured, despite any depth of iniquity. No
polity ever lasted in which some did not live to God ;
and if some, why not all, by their example in word
and work?
We have every reason, then, to anticipate great
changes within Christianity, because polity is in
process of such profound alteration. The strain
of society grows tenser and, with it, the temptation
to treat the individual as a helpless means. Conse-
quently, one must expect religion to invoke new
powers calculated to convince latter-day men of
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 347
the value of life, as in every case consecrated by the
indwelling of the eternal. The polity demands
sacrifice, and useless sacrifice apparently, more and
more. If this subordination of the individual to a
temporary, and therefore imperfect, universal can-
not be justified by the spiritualization of the 'secular'
group, then dissolution is as certain as sunrise. In
the circumstances, the necessity for renewed and
renewing development within Christianity becomes
entirely obvious.
Is a permanent expansion of polity possible, under
the so-called ' law ' of evolution, except on a funda-
mental basis of religious idealism? Sociological
science leads us to conclude that it is in the highest
degree unlikely. Even the founder of Positivism
voiced this view with perfect candour. For, the
pervasive unity, essential to the process (' the
eternal arms' that support, as religion would phrase
it), underlies mere separate individuals, and provides
supersocial supports. If we are nonplussed to-day,
it is because, lost amid a multitude of minor interests,
we lose sight of this. Talleyrand was right when,
consulted by Larevellere-Lepeaux about a remedy
for the inefiiciency of sugar-water 'ethical culture,'
he replied: "There is one plan you might at least
try. I should recommend you to be crucified and to
348 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
rise again the third day." Yes, the settings of
civilization change, but human need of communion
with an 'absolute' remains essentially the same.
And, for this, Christianity must continue to provide,
though with marked difference of emphasis, suited to
the possibilities of assimilation. In brief, the details
of life in a polity might well drive one to despair;
nevertheless, man's staying power, that transmutes
these details into significant and authoritative
reality, evinces supersocial traits, shot forth from an
upper dimension alone productive of thoroughgoing
devotion. To unify the two, as need arises, con-
stitutes the mission and the justification of religion —
for us, Christianity. For the polity can be saved only
by defensible belief in self — and this never existed
without belief in "a divinity that shapes our ends."
Religion elicits and instils the loyalty without which
human experience, even in the superindividual
realm of a polity, crumbles into transiency. Here
we labour in the valley of blessing. The play of
comedy in tragedy, the load of tragedy in comedy,
intimate no less.
The theoretical question, Is the 'absolute'
element in Christianity in such process of change
that it may be overpassed some day ? would carry
us far afield. If we can only see why it should be
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 349
asked, we shall have done something. On the face
of it, the enquiry states a paradox, one that emerges
from the paradoxical character of self-consciousness.
Everybody admits that self-consciousness compasses
but a fragment of ultimate truth as a whole. Yet,
on the other hand, we ask helplessly, Where else shall
we look for this very truth ? The microcosm of the
universe, as reflected back by our experience, cannot
be devoid of all reality in the last resort, so far as we
are concerned. Something in self laughs at change,
or the bare notion of unity becomes illusory. Never-
theless, ''change and decay in all around I see," not
least in self. Accordingly, the single solution would
seem to be that, by the changes through which self
passes, its inner unity reaches working immut-
ability in measure. The old self, that seemed 'ab-
solute,' finds itself overpassed in a new development,
identical in nature, notwithstanding the interference
of the process. The personal relations constitutive
of originating manhood never alter their texture, if
we have but skill to pierce their temporary envelope.
Still, in expression, defect always seals or modifies
them from period to period, and so they cannot but
overpass this or that degree eventually. So, if the
unity of God, unsullied by imperfection, fails of
identity with any particular apparition of selfhood it
350 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
results, therefore, that the indwelling of this unity
with our souls, as it proceeds from less to more,
must involve the possibility at least of such restate-
ment of the Christian ' absolute ' that it may overpass
itself, and still preserve its synthetic touch unim-
paired. A human revelation, or none, is practicable
among men. Thus, the revelation may be stable,
on the side of the ultimate power implied, and
transitional in its human media. It would savour
of impiety, for example, to attribute virtue to God ;
virtue ensues upon sin overcome. Yet sin plays an
important part in Christianity, particularly in its
conception of the relation between God and man.
And theologians have often presented it as if it bore
specifically upon actual alteration within the Divine
nature. Now, this intimates no more than the double
character of ordinary life. Blessed though we be, we
still abide the question in the valley. Hence the par-
adoxical problem before us teems with possibilities, be-
cause, in the unavoidable circumstances, ambiguity
besets Christianity. A couple of illustrations may suf-
fice to show why, and to close our discussion. Neces-
sarily, they are selected from theology. For, after
all, the paradox deals with Christianity as formulated,
that is, as ambiguous. There are Roman, Anglican,
Lutheran, Reformed, Unitarian, and other theologies,
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 35 1
for the reason that this or the other facet of religion
may cease to shine, or may be the single luminous
point.
As we are discussing the ' absoluteness ' of ' Chris-
tian truth/ suppose we select the doctrine of God as
our first example. All believers will assent to the
great Johannine declaration : " God is a spirit :
and they that worship him must worship him in
spirit and in truth." ^ But, then, no spirit exists
without process, and process never occurs in vacuo.
So, one part of the environment wherein the process
proceeds may be, often is, mistaken for the whole.
As a matter of fact, the self-poised oneness of God
has shut out other coordinate revelations frequently.
But with little warrant from the Master. In the
most wonderful of the many wonderful passages
containing the charter of Christianity,^ John makes
Jesus teach the disciples how they, as men in a
world of men, may escape this error. ''Neverthe-
less I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you
that I go away: for if I go not away, the Com-
forter will not come unto you; but if I depart,
I will send him unto you. ... I have yet many
things to say unto you, but ye cannot bear them
now. Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth is come,
he will guide you into all truth." ^ The temporary
^ John iv. 24. ^ John xiv-xvii. ^ John xvi. 7, 12-13.
352 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
theophany, because in a human being, must needs
pass, to be succeeded by a permanent and ubiqui-
tous presence. For those who have not seen, as
Jesus reaUzes, the reality of the Godhead will con-
tinue to persist through the unbroken activity of the
Holy Spirit. Accordingly, it is not too much to say
that, when we have plumbed these marvellous in-
sights to their depths, we may read our own situation
in a new light, Here below, in our stage and state,
the effective presence, wherein Father and Son alike
may be discerned, and known concretely, belongs to
"the Lord and Giver of Life." Moreover, the re-
sultant supersession of many conventional doctrines
about God may prove a necessary accompaniment of
our transformed knowledge of self and the universe.
Nay, it may be indispensable as a development pari
passu with our growing appreciation of the structure
and function of human society. In any event, we
begin to cross-examine ourselves afresh concerning the
society called the church. And we may well ask, Is
a vital conception of the church attainable apart from
such a view of the office of the Holy Spirit as I have
indicated? As a churchman, I understand my soci-
ety to be the superindividual community enlivened
by the constant intercourse of the Holy Spirit. Fur-
ther, I am unable to see that, under other conditions,
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 353
we are justified in regarding it as the peculiar organ
of religion. If its existence mean anything, it is
this — that in it God is known of Himself. So far
as broken human experience judges, superindividual
power can appear only in relations of persons ; and
they achieve personality, as we have seen, precisely
by the transitive touch of that Eternal wherein,
fairly enough, we may avow the Holy Spirit. But,
then, this superindividual power attains its purest
tension in a communal whole. "I am glorified in
them^ Consequently, God, as the Holy Spirit,
becomes the 'absolute,' not merely for us, but with us.
Dominated, as we are, by the idea of development,
it is not enough that we sense the superindividual
in self ; we seek it also, and more richly, in the super-
social, whereby a man is fortified unto the larger
life. And this manifestation the church, as the
subject of the Holy Spirit, ought to offer in unex-
ampled degree. The greatest thinker of the nine-
teenth century understood the position clearly:
''finite consciousness knows God only to the ex-
tent to which God knows Himself in it ; thus God
is Spirit, the Spirit of His Church in fact, that is,
of those who worship Him."^
Thus, while conserving the ' absolute ' in principle,
^ Philosophy of Religion, Hegel, vol. ii, p. 327 (Eng. trans.).
2 A
354 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
it is quite possible that Christianity, quickened, as
it must be, by the latest demands of Christian men,
may overpass its venerable dogmas of the static,
transcendent nature of Deity, and concentrate its
insistence upon the operative process of the Holy
Spirit, through the church, for the world. In this
sense, it would liberate itself from a transient meth-
odism, and proceed, as by a fresh burst of inspira-
tion, to tell our epoch all things that ever it did.
And many events are less likely than the establish-
ment of ' Christian truth ' on this wise.
Coming, now, to our second example, it is not
impossible that our intellectual explanations of the
immediate appearance of God in Jesus may be over-
passed. Jesus was a man, born of the flesh under
the law, and therefore finite in the same way as his
brethren. He was subject to all physical necessities,
and had human character no less than human frame.
Hence, one of the ambiguities of Christianity attaches
to the view, not uncommon in Christendom, that this
particular finite contained the "whole fulness of the
Godhead bodily." No doubt, the reason for such
an interpretation is not far to seek. Ordinary un-
derstanding, or common-sense, always leans upon
the sensuous. Nay, some peoples, of eminent
influence in the development of Christian thought,
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 355
have been unable to rise above it, all in all. For
example, it masters most Roman and Anglican
reflexion. Now, thanks just to its sensuous basis,
common-sense misses the implications of God-man-
hood, by confining its attention to a single individual,
as if this being, by some strange freak, alone enjoyed
communion with the Eternal. It fails to observe that
such a conclusion knocks the bottom out of religion.
Jesus fell a victim to no such deception. He lived
to do the Father's will. He manifested God to the
utmost possible with men. For our sakes he became
poor, and therefore drank the cup of sense to the lees.
As a human experient, he served himself an incar-
nation of one type of the divine process — the most
real for us, be it said. Nevertheless, he was no
statesman, or philosopher, or naturalist, or poet, or
artist. These types of revelation must be sought
elsewhere. Yet, he gave the decisive answer to the
riddle of existence, not from God's, but from man's
side. It was essential that the problem of the prac-
ticable union between men and the Eternal should
be made plain. In other words, stereotyped theories
may be overpassed, if the stress of the Christian
incarnation be shifted from the divine to the human
factor. For our religion contains other truths, and,
consequently, there is an obvious sense in which.
356 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
on some readings of it, the incarnation may become
a half truth. For, in Jesus, it was limited to time
and place. That is, Jesus came to show, by his faith-
fulness to death, what Christ might be. His person
is unique, but so are all other persons. When it had
passed away, and not till then, believers were able
to refine the humane element, and seize upon the
essential idea, which remains, as Christ, to witness
the life eternal.
To state the process — for it is a process — other-
wise. You fathom Jesus just in proportion as you
discern in him a normal and not an abnormal
(thaumaturgic or pagan) apparition of the Eternal
in human nature. He preferred no claim to stand
in place of God. This broke forth, and inevitably,
from the awakened consciousness of the disciples.
In like manner, we contemporary disciples, through
whom Christianity energizes now, derive the God-
ideal from him. Jesus homo has long given place
to Jesus salvator — Christ. Our need 'proves' the
divinity of Christ, for our devotion, according to its
ratio, evaporates the accidental and physical, leav-
ing only the Divine Person. The adaptation of
Christianity to man's necessity, and not the static
unchangeable character of a Syrian peasant, embodies
the benison. In Christ, human nature descries the
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 357
way wherein it may walk, so transcending its own
frailties as to arrive at renewed unity with the God
Whom the world had lost nigh irrevocably.
Thus Christianity preserves its 'absoluteness' in
the sense that it remains impervious to attacks from
without. And, if we could but realize the liberty
wherewith Christ hath made us free, we would imder-
stand that there are no such things as attacks from
within. For the complete truth of religion issues
from its devotees, each building his little bit of the
opulent whole according to his God-given power, or
purity, or mental sweep. They keep it in process of
constant enrichment and, on the contrary, such are
their responsibilities, reduce it on occasion to the
level of uninspired, even repellent, prose. On this
wise it partakes of that change without which the
vital presence of operative spiritual reality sinks to a
flatulent verbalism. Be sure, 'Christian truth' en-
visages a career, does not dictate a logical judge-
ment. Accordingly, from generation to generation,
this or that feature of the life glows in high light,
while other traits lie in shadow — mayhap because
they are overpassed. As Hegel saw, we must rise
beyond knowledge to faith. "If we say nothing
more of Christ than that He was a teacher of hu-
manity, a martyr for the truth, we do not occupy
358 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
the Christian standpoint, the standpoint of true
religion." ^ Thus, paradoxically, it boots nothing
to assert the exclusive presence of God in this or
that man. ''The teaching of Christ taken by itself
belongs to the world of ordinary figurative ideas only,
and takes to do with the inner feeling and disposi-
tion ; it is supplemented by the representation of the
Divine Idea in His life and fate." ^ So, the static
conception is left behind when we detect the eternal
Christ in the man Jesus. The cross is the baptism
of human consciousness into Christ. For those
who have not seen, there is no Epiphany without
Easter. We overpass the historical accidents and,
piercing to the 'absolute' that makes them possible,
retain it as 'absolute,' no matter in what fashion
our historical accidents may persuade us to represent
it most effectually to our hearts. The blessing abides
one, but ever amid the chances of the valley.
But all this brings us back full circle to the point
of departure in the Introductory Lecture. There
are intellectual constructions of belief necessary to
* Christian truth,' and they alter with the flight of
^ Philosophy of Religion, vol. iii, pp. 77-78 (Eng. trans.).
2 Philosophy of Religion, Hegel, vol. iii, p. 85 (Eng. trans.). The
italics are mine.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 359
years. For instance, the clamant question to-day
is not. What shall / do to be saved? The 'other
world' keeps too closely with us for this. Modern
thought refuses to endure a dual universe; Spirit
is unseen Nature, Nature is unseen Spirit. In our
present condition, we rather ask. What is the perfect
society? And, to answer it, admitting the funda-
mental postulates of religion as I have tried to sketch
them, we cannot but travel beyond ancient tran-
scripts, which become religious dangers when they
erect barriers to every movement. But we fare forth
thus in order to obtain closer walk with God. Christ
rules, not the past, but our future, if we will to become,
after our clearest vision, as He would have us be.
It avails naught to imitate bygone thinkers, or even
saints. The message gushes from our inward con-
sciousness, to receive heed from us as we veritably
are, or keeps the dead, decent level of a tale that is
told. The cheering assurance, given by one of the
several New Testament prophets who seemed to
foresee our straits, possesses authority as pertinent
to the twentieth century as to the distant day when
it was set down first. "And all these, having ob-
tained a good report through faith, received not the
promise: God having provided some better thing
for uSy that they without us should not be made
360 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
perfect." ^ Life eternal is a present state, ours to
take or leave. As Christians, we gain this certainty
by adoption into Christ, Who has proven that self,
in its ultimate reality, enjoys free course only when
the Eternal power functioning within it transforms
every fibre of its being. But, reverently be it said,
even the Eternal can accomplish nothing unless we
meet it more than halfway.
Seen through the prism of intellect, as the tran-
sient generations must see it, 'Christian truth' yet
remains one in whiteness of simplicity. "I in them,
and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in
one." ^ That is all ! And, because all, capable of
endless restatement, of multitudinous application.
We support life in the Valley of Blessing, or curse
it in the Valley of Hinnom, where the fair palm
trees mark the smoke ascending from the door of
Gehenna.^ Like other Christians, I cannot 'prove'
these things, any more than I can 'prove' my own
existence. But I am able to say humbly, / know.
I am saluted by the discordant shouts of the old,
old quarrel between the 'head' and the 'heart,' a
duel destined to last with the human race. But
the two could not disagree unless they belonged
^ Hebrews xi. 39, 40. ^ John xvii. 23.
5 Cf . City of the Great King, Barclay, p. 90.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 361
together. Patience with the plea of each alone will
set the door of truth ajar. For neither has reason
to say to the other, "I have no need of thee."
Thought, without emotion, never accomplished
anything permanent; emotion, without thought,
never escaped the young folly of self-love. Slight
either, and you seek trouble; give heed to both,
and, happily, you may begin to perceive that they
prefer equal title to membership in an ampler whole.
So, in these Lectures, I have let the *head' pursue
its own course to the bitter end, only to find that,
whatever the end, the * heart ' refuses to rest satisfied.
For religion happens to be one thing, thought about
religion a vastly different affair. Yet we are com-
pelled to think about belief. Indeed, the practical
character of Christianity requires to be brought
home by some species of reflexion. Practice ' proves '
truth, but practice formulated by the ' head.'
What else can we gather from the illustration with
which I may be permitted to close? Let me lift
the corner of a veil that men keep down generally,
and you will see what I mean. If some poor souls,
the bloom of youth still ruddy upon them, came to
you, and confessed, with the awful shudder conveyed
most faintly by physical gesture, 'We have been at
the very gates of hell,' or, 'We have seen hell incar-
362 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
nate,' you would know. Fortunately, or unfortu-
nately, I have encountered this satanic work more
than once and, like my boyhood friend, Henry
Drummond, "have felt that I must go and change
my very clothes after the contact." ^ Here we have
another process, down, not up, but, in its subtle
movement, identical essentially with the Christian
ascent. For, "identical conditions produce the
hero and the coward." ^ He who exclaims rashly,
"Evil, be thou my good !" also senses the eternal in
self, if to dire purpose. Now, ask the father of any
vicious lad, the mother of any light girl, whether
these things are true, whether they stand in need of
* proof.' You will find that they know, alas! The
power of creative emotion witnesses itself; and
this power, at its tensest, patient to endure from day
to day through the commonest worries of mortal
chance, forms at once the supposition and the
achievement of any 'Christian truth' worth the
name. "Inward and spiritual grace" shines by
its own light. It knows, yet is unable to explain,
recognizing that explanations fail to satisfy the
'head,' because, manifestly, they fail to compass
the 'heart.' The one knows, but during a moment
^ The Life of Henry Drummond, George Adam Smith, p. 11.
^ The Gospel in the Gospels, W. P. Du Bose, p. 89.
THE VALLEY OF BLESSING 363
only, for, in the nature of the case, the other punc-
tuates every proposition with discontent; and tlien
a new effort at truth becomes inevitable. Fresh
sheaves are fetched to the threshing floor daily,
otherwise the kernel of ideal, eternal fact would go
to powder, and lose its living essence amid the
elusive, superficial chaff. But we, the latest har-
vest, must supply new grain for sustenance and
seeding, even if its value may not have been struck
as yet.
Nay more, on this threshing floor those who pul-
sate with the sacrificial throb of the race hasten to take
the shoes from off their feet, for the place whereon
they stand is holy ground. Here the elemental
human spirit has been released through ages, to
live on at this moment an inherent part of the palpi-
tating present reality. Here, for the Christian con-
sciousness, the eternal Christ inhabits, a pervasive
influence able to mould all souls to its translucent
nature. Here men hang their picture of the Christ-
type, the wistful shadow brooding on the face, be-
cause He knows only too well that His brethren must
continue in His sufferings till the world's end, so
be they would achieve some vital share in His potent
wholeness, and learn from it how to
" Give consolation in this woe extreme/'
364 MODERN THOUGHT AND THE CRISIS IN BELIEF
wrought by the cold touch of the abstract intellect.
Here the captains of our temporal strife meet
martyrdom in their transitive personality. As for
Him, so for them,
"The age in which they live
Will not forgive
The splendour of the everlasting light
That makes their foreheads bright,
Nor the sublime forerunning of their time."
The glorious unity wherein they are thus lost, to
find their truest selves, seals the promise of that
final consummation, the Kingdom of Heaven, now
in the winning. So His creation striveth — creat-
ing Him. And, if the mystics be few, the wand-
bearers many, let us remember constantly that the
few must receive from the many that human extract
whence they distil their message of new hope,
bringing the Christ near, because expressing His
secret in contemporary language, moods, and as-
pirations.
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